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The 

Bradford  A.  Booth  Collection 


in 


English  and  American 
Literature 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2007  with  funding  from 

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http://www.archive.org/details/actormanagerOOmerriala 


The  Works  of  Leonard  Merrick 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 


The  Works  of 
LEONARD  MERRICK 


CONRAD  IN  QUEST  OP  HIS  YOUTH.  With 
an  Introduction  by  Sib  J.  M.  Barrie. 

WHEN  LOVE  FLIES  OUT  O'  THE  WINDOW. 
With  an  Introduction  by  Sib  William  Robebt- 
son  Nicoll. 

THE  QUAINT  COMPANIONS.  With  an  Intro- 
duction by  H.  G.  Wells. 

THE  POSITION  OF  PEGGY  HARPER.  With 
an  Introduction  by  Sir  Abthub  Pinebo. 

THE  MAN  WHO  UNDERSTOOD  WOMEN  and 
other  Stories.  With  an  Introduction  by  W.  J. 
Locke. 

THE  WORLDLINGS.  With  an  Introduction  by 
Neil  Munbo. 

THE  ACTOR-MANAGER.  With  an  Introduction 
by  W.  D.  Howells. 

CYNTHIA.  With  an  Introduction  by  Maubicb 
Hewlett. 

ONE  MAN'S  VIEW.  With  an  Introduction  by 
Granville  Barker. 

THE  MAN  WHO  WAS  GOOD.  With  an  Intro- 
duction  by  J.  K.  Prothero. 

A  CHAIR  ON  THE  BOULEVARD.  With  an 
Introduction  by  A.  Neil  Lyons. 

THE  HOUSE  OF  LYNCH.  With  an  Introduc- 
tion by  G.  K.  Chesterton. 

WHILE  PARIS  LAUGHED:  Being  Pranks  and 
Passions  of  the  Poet  Tricotrin. 


NEW  YORK 
E.  P.  DUTTON  &  COMPANY 


THE 

ACTOR-MANAGER 

¥ 

By    LEONARD    MERRICK 

¥ 

WITH  AN  INTRODUCTION  BY 
WILLIAM  DEAN  HOWELLS 


NEW  YORK 

E.  P.  DUTTON  AND  COMPANY 


Copyright,  1919, 
BY  E.  P.  DUTTON  AND  COMPANY 


AU  Rights  Reserved 


The  First  American  Definitive  Edition,  with  Introduction 

by  W.  D.  Howells,  limited  to  1550  copies 

(of  which  only  1500  were  for  sale). 

Published  May  12th,  1919. 
Second  American  Edition,  May,  1919 
Third  "  "  July,  1919 

Fourth         "  -    October,  1919 

Fifth  "  "         "         1919 

Sixth  "  "      August,  1920 

Eeissued,  June,  1932 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


INTRODUCTION 

Anglo-Saxon  fiction,  either  in  its  English  or 
in  its  American  condition,  is  not  so  rich  in  form 
that  one  who  feels  its  penury  can  pass  any  excep- 
tion by,  and  not  dread  coming  to  actual  want. 
A  keen<  perhaps  a  quivering,  sense  of  this,  was 
what  made  me,  in  my  first  acquaintance  with  the 
novels  of  Mr.  Leonard  Merrick,  resolve  to  share 
with  the  public  my  pleasure  in  their  singular 
shapeliness.  No  doubt,  a  great  many  of  our 
short  stories  have  form;  but  here  it  is  a  question 
of  novels,  and  not  of  short  stories.  In  short 
stories,  it  is  rather  difficult  not  to  have  form;  in 
novels,  it  is  so  difficult  that  I  can  think  of  no 
recent  fictionist  of  his  race  or  nation  who  can 
quite  match  with  Mr.  Merrick  in  that  excellence. 
This  will  seem  great  praise,  possibly  too  great, 
to  the  few  who  have  a  sense  of  such  excellence; 
but  it  will  probably  be  without  real  meaning  to 
most,  though  our  public  might  very  well  enjoy 
form  if  it  could  once  be  made  to  imagine  it.  In 
order  to  this  end,  we  should  have  first  to  define 
what  form  was,  but  form  is  one  of  those  elusive 
things  which  you  can  feel  much  better  than  you 
can  say ;  to  define  it  would  be  like  defining  charm 

v 


vi  INTRODUCTION 

in  a  woman,  or  poetry  in  a  verse.  Possibly,  in 
order  to  enforce  my  point,  I  should  have  to  bid 
the  reader  take  almost  any  novel  of  Mr.  Mer- 
rick's and  read  it ;  for  then  he  would  know  what 
form  was.  Possibly,  this  is  the  conclusion  to 
which  I  must  come  now,  but  I  do  not  deny  that 
this  would  be  what  is  called  "begging  the  ques- 
tion." 

As  to  the  world  which  this  excellent  form 
embodies,  it  may  be  said,  first,  that  every  writer 
of  fiction  creates  the  world  where  his  characters 
live.  Of  course,  if  he  is  an  artist,  it  is  vital  to 
him  to  believe  he  is  representing  the  world  where 
he  lives  himself;  and  in  a  certain  measure  he  is 
doing  so,  but  he  is  always  giving  their  habitat 
stricter  limits  than  his  own.  One  of  the  con- 
ditions of  every  art  is  that  its  created  world 
must  be  a  microcosm;  even  if  it  is  not  avowedly 
a  fragment,  the  portrait  it  paints  of  life  is  a 
miniature  where  everything  but  the  essentials  are 
left  out.  If  its  effects  are  wisely  meditated,  it 
will  sometimes  show  that  the  essentials  are  the 
little  things  and  not  the  large  things.  The  scene 
does  not  matter;  the  quality  or  station  of  the 
actors  in  it  does  not  count;  nothing  matters  or 
counts  but  the  effect  of  reality.  It  is  a  very 
narrow  world  Mr.  Merrick  deals  with,  and  of 
events  so  few  that  it  is  wonderful  how  con- 


INTRODUCTION  vii 

tinually  he  provokes  the  reader's  curiosity  and 
holds  his  interest,  though  for  the  young  and  kind, 
or  for  the  old  and  wise,  it  is  a  world  which  will 
always  have  a  glamour,  will  be  misted  in  an 
illusion  such  as  wraps  the  persons  whom  its 
people  are  engaged  in  representing,  either  in  the 
novel  or  in  the  drama.  In  other  terms,  and  I 
hope  simpler  terms,  his  story  is  commonly  the 
story  of  obscure  talent  struggling  to  the  light  in 
those  very  uncertain  avenues  to  distinction  and 
prosperity;  and  he  contrives  to  vary  it  only  by 
the  different  phases  of  their  failure  or  success, 
which  is  always  the  same  sort  of  failure  and 
success.  I  do  not  know  why  the  events  should 
be  of  more  appreciable  human  concern  than  com- 
parable events  in  the  lives  of  rising  or  falling 
painters,  sculptors  and  architects,  who  should 
equally  appeal  in  their  like  quality  of  artists. 
But  it  is  certain  that  we  somehow  feel  an  enchant- 
ment in  the  career  of  the  artists  who  create 
characters  in  fiction,  or  represent  them  in  the 
theatre,  which  we  do  not  feel  in  the  careers  of 
those  other  artists.  It  may  be  that  this  is  because 
we  live  longer  with  their  creations  or  represen- 
tations, and  therefore  are  better  acquaintance  or 
closer  friends  with  the  creators.  You  cannot 
linger  two  or  three  days  on  the  details  of  a 
picture  or  a  statue  or  a  building,  as  you  can  on 


viii  INTRODUCTION 

those  of  a  novel,  or  even  three  hours,  as  you  can 
on  those  of  a  play ;  and  you  cannot  know  them  so 
well  that  you  long  to  know  the  author  or  actor, 
and  attribute  to  him  all  sorts  of  personal  interest, 
which  perhaps  experience  would  not  realize  in 
him.  In  any  case,  it  is  certain  that,  since  fiction 
ceased  to  concern  itself  solely  with  kings  and 
princes,  or  even  with  the  nobility  and  gentry,  it 
has  found  nothing  of  such  sovereign  effect  with 
the  reader  as  the  aspirations  and  adventures  of 
people,  the  younger  the  people  the  better,  trying 
to  get  past  the  publisher  or  the  manager  into  the 
light  of  the  public  square.  These  at  present 
share  the  sort  of  "pull"  which  the  pirate  and  the 
robber,  the  seducer  and  the  seduced,  the  pick- 
pocket and  the  pauper,  the  bankrupt,  the  rightful 
heir,  the  good  and  the  bad  trades-unionist,  the 
muscular  Christian,  the  burglar  and  the  detec- 
tive, all  once  enjoyed  in  turn,  and  now  enjoy  no 
longer,  at  least  with  the  polite  reader;  and  it 
ought  to  be  fortunate  for  Mr.  Merrick  that  his 
novels  are  mainly  concerned  with  them  in  the 
hour  of  their  surpassing  attractiveness.  I  have, 
of  course,  no  belief  that  he  chose  them  because 
of  their  pull;  it  is  much  more  probable  that,  in 
the  strange  way  these  things  come  about,  he  was 
chosen  by  them  because  of  his  personal  intimacy 
with  their  experiences.    It  is  scarcely  pertinent 


INTRODUCTION  k 

to  conjecture  that  the  material  of  his  fiction,  out 
of  which  he  has  shaped  its  persons  and  events, 
is  employed  at  first  hand.  A  much  more  impor- 
tant fact  is  that  he  is  always  and  instinctively 
artist  enough  to  employ  it  for  the  stuff  it  is,  and 
that  he  has  not  attempted,  so  far  as  I  can  make 
out,  to  pass  off  any  clay  image  of  his  fabrication 
for  a  statue  of  pure  gold,  or  even  of  gilded 
bronze.  No  squalor  of  that  world  of  his  is 
blinked,  and  we  learn  to  trust  him,  not  perhaps 
quite  implicitly,  for  a  faithful  report  of  the  world 
he  knows  so  well,  but  implicitly  enough,  because 
he  seems  to  have  no  question  as  to  his  function 
in  regard  to  it.  He  is  quite  as  honest  as  a  Latin 
or  a  Slav  would  be  in  his  place,  and  never  as 
dishonest  as  some  other  Anglo-Saxon  might  be. 

He  is  not  so  much  in  the  bonds  of  superstition 
concerning  passion  as  most  novelists,  and  there- 
fore he  is  not  of  the  inferior  novelists;  he  ranks 
himself  with  the  great  ones  in  that.  He  has  the 
courage  to  own  that  certain  veritable  passions 
die  long  before  those  who  have  known  them  are 
dead.  Apparently,  he  has  seen  this  happen  in 
the  world  among  real  men  and  women,  and  he 
portrays  the  fact  as  he  has  seen  it  happen.  His 
fidelity  cannot  recommend  him  to  the  "world  that 
loves  a  lover"  so  much  that  it  will  not  allow  that 
he  can  ever  cease  to  be  a  lover;  but  it  ought  to 


x  INTRODUCTION 

make  him  friends  with  the  few  who  love  truth 
better  even  than  lovers.  At  any  rate,  it  is  the 
event  in  several  of  his  books,  in  perhaps  the  best 
of  them,  though  sometimes  he  sacrifices  to  the 
false  god  also,  and  has  lovers  go  on  loving  with  a 
constancy  which  ought  to  have  made  him  a  wider 
public  than  I  am  afraid  he  has. 

Of  the  two  arch-enemies  of  love,  prosperity 
and  adversity,  he  makes  the  oftener  study  of 
adversity.  There  is  a  great  deal  of  grim  adversity 
in  his  books,  which  sometimes  remains  adversity 
to  the  end,  but  also  sometimes  puts  off  its  frown. 
It  is  the  more  depressing  when  it  becomes  or 
remains  the  atmosphere  of  that  ambition  which 
seeks  fruition  in  the  successes  of  the  theatre.  If 
we  are  to  believe  him,  and  somehow  Mr.  Merrick 
mostly  makes  you  believe  him,  the  poor  creatures, 
usually  poor  women  creatures,  who  are  trying 
to  get  upon  the  stage,  are  almost  without  number, 
and  certainly  outnumber  the  struggling  jour- 
nalists and  authors  a  hundred  to  one.  The 
spectacles  of  their  humility  and  humiliation,  of 
their  meek  endeavours  and  cruel  defeats,  are  of 
such  frequent  recurrence  in  his  novels  and  tales 
that,  after  a  little  knowledge  of  them,  one  ap- 
proaches the  scene  with  an  expectation  of  heart- 
ache through  which  nothing  short  of  the  mastery 
dealing  with  them  would  support  one.     In  the 


INTRODUCTION  xi 

monotony  of  the  event,  it  is  very  remarkable 
how  he  distinguishes  and  characterizes  the  dif- 
ferent children  of  adversity,  especially  the  daugh- 
ters. They  are  commonly  alike  in  their  adversity, 
but  they  are  individual  in  their  way  of  experienc- 
ing it.  In  fact,  in  an  age  of  intensely  feminized 
fiction,  he  is  one  of  the  first  of  those  who  know 
how  to  catch  the  likenesses,  to  the  last  fleeting 
expression,  of  women;  and  especially  women  of 
the  theatre.  Probably,  these  are  not  essentially 
different  from  other  women,  but  they  have  an 
evolution  through  their  environment  which  no 
one  else  seems  to  have  studied  so  well.  Some- 
times they  are  good  women  and  sometimes  they 
are  bad,  but  they  are  so  from  a  temperament 
differently  affected  by  their  errant  and  public 
life,  their  starved  or  surfeited  vanity,  their  craze 
for  change  and  variety,  and  they  keep  a  sim- 
plicity, a  singleness,  in  their  selfishness  and 
depravity,  such  as  differences  them  from  women 
bred  amidst  the  artificialities  of  the  world  on  the 
other  side  of  the  footlights.  It  would  be  easy 
to  name  a  score  of  them  from  his  pages,  but  it  is 
sufficient  to  name  Blanche  Ellerton  in  The 
Actor-Manager  as  a  supreme  type;  Nature 
meant  her  for  the  theatre  only. 

There  is  no  perceptible  mechanism  in  the  story 
of  The  Actor-Manager,  in  every  way  the  best  of 


xii  INTRODUCTION 

Mr.  Merrick's  stories  so  far  as  I  know  them.  At 
all  moments  of  it  you  feel  that  it  happened,  and 
that  the  people  in  it  are  alive,  with  a  life  of  human 
probabilities  beyond  it.  I  can  recall  no  English 
novel  in  which  the  study  of  temperament  and 
character  is  carried  farther  or  deeper,  allowing 
for  what  the  people  are,  and  I  do  not  remember 
a  false  or  mistaken  line  or  colour  in  it.  For  any- 
thing to  equal  it,  we  must  go  to  the  Slavs,  in  such 
triumphs  of  their  naturalness  as  Tourguenieff's 
Smoke,  or  the  society  passages  of  Tolstoy's  War 
and  Peace.  The  French  stories  are  conventional 
in  their  naturalism  beside  it;  perhaps  a  Spaniard 
like  Galdos  has  done  work  of  equal  fineness.  It 
is  not  alone  in  Royce  Oliphant,  with  the  stress 
of  his  hereditary  conscience,  or  in  Blanche  Eller- 
ton,  depraved  both  by  her  artistry  and  by  her 
ambition,  that  the  author  convinces;  Otho  Fair- 
bairn,  who  becomes  the  "scoundrel"  that  Blanche 
not  less  deliberately  than  hysterically  makes  him 
for  his  money,  and  Alma  King,  who  is  as  good 
an  artist  as  Blanche  and  yet  a  good  woman,  and 
Blanche's  mother  whose  sentimental  novelettes 
support  her  contemptuous  husband  in  the  pro- 
duction of  his  real  but  unmerchantable  master- 
pieces, and  Blanche's  plain  sister  with  her  famine 
for  a  little  love,  a  little  admiration  from  men, 
are  all  in  their  several  ways  entirely  lif  elike.    The 


INTRODUCTION  xiii 

theatre  itself,  which  began  as  a  theatre  of  art,  and 
ended  as  a  theatre  of  profit,  has  almost  a  human 
appeal  in  its  tragedy,  as  if  it  were  a  sentient 
organism,  with  a  heart  to  be  broken  and  a  soul 
to  be  lost.  Nobody  who  is  not  inevitably  bad 
is  very  bad;  in  the  book  the  world  is  the  world 
we  live  in. 

Why,  then,  is  not  this  masterly  novelist  a 
master  universally  recognized  and  accepted? 
That  is  something  I  have  asked  myself  more  than 
once,  especially  in  reading  the  criticisms  of  his 
several  books,  not  one  of  which  has  lacked  the 
praise  of  some  critic  qualified  to  carry  conviction 
of  its  merit.  Perhaps  the  secret  is  that  the  stories 
are  almost  always  very  unhappy.  There  is  no 
consolation  in  their  tragedy;  they  do  not  even 
"raise  a  noble  terror,"  such  as  was  once  the  sup- 
posed business  of  tragedy.  Upon  the  whole,  they 
leave  you  feeling  mean,  feeling  retroactively 
capable  of  the  shabby  things  which  have  been 
done  in  them.  Another  secret  may  be  that,  when 
the  poverty  which  haunts  them  is  relieved  in  this 
case  or  that,  you  are  left  with  a  sense  of  the 
vast  poverty  still  remaining  in  the  world;  if  a 
struggler  is  given  a  chance  to  get  his  breath, 
the  great  struggle  of  life  goes  on.  Still  another 
secret  may  be  that  there  is  no  fine  world,  no 
great  world,  in  the  books;  we  scarcely  recall  a 


xiv  INTRODUCTION 

person  of  title  in  any  of  them,  and  people  who 
like  to  associate  with  the  rich  or  great,  when  they 
are  "taken  out  of  themselves,"  have  not  the  com- 
pany of  so  much  as  one  high-born  villain,  one 
corrupt  grande  dame.  Socially  it  is  not  "good 
company"  we  find  ourselves  in,  and  morally  it 
is  not  even  the  "best  company"  as  Jane  Austen 
calls  it;  and  yet  it  is  somehow  consoling,  some- 
how encouraging  to  have  known  such  a  good 
and  clever  man  as  Royce  Oliphant,  such  a  good 
yet  gifted  woman  as  Alma  King,  even  such  a 
kind  wrong-doing  soul  as  Otho  Fairbairn,  or 
such  a  gentle,  modest,  unselfish  creature  as  the 
mother  of  Blanche  Ellerton,  earning  her  hus- 
band's bread  by  writing  the  popular  novelettes 
which  enable  him  to  write  his  unpopular  novels 
and  despise  her  trash  on  a  full  stomach.  Very 
likely  Mr.  Merrick  may  have  had  his  moments 
of  consciously  contriving  the  story  in  The  Actor- 
Manager  and  of  actuating  his  characters  in  con- 
formity with  a  preconceived  plan,  but  he  does 
not  suffer  his  readers  to  share  these  humiliating 
moments.  For  all  they  know,  the  things  hap- 
pened from  the  nature  of  the  characters  in  the 
given  circumstances  with  no  apparent  agency 
of  his. 

W.  D.  Ho  WELLS. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

CHAPTER  I 

There  used  to  be,  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the 
Museum,  an  eating-house,  of  which  the  feature 
was  a  three-course  dinner  for  sixpence.  On  a 
board  in  the  doorway  was  inscribed  "First-class 
Room  Upstairs,"  and  this  was  well  worth  visit- 
ing. Its  true  attraction,  however,  did  not  he  in 
its  steaming  soup,  its  colonial  meat,  nor  its  im- 
pregnable pastry,  but  in  the  study  of  its  patrons. 
Eschewing  the  ground-floor,  where,  to  the  casual 
observer,  the  dirt  of  the  diners  obscured  their 
interest,  one  found  oneself  among  pale-faced 
girls  in  sage-green  frocks  of  eccentric  pattern, 
among  young  men  with  bilious  bows  and  abun- 
dant hair.  These  were  "art-students" — to  use 
the  comprehensive  term  by  which  the  students 
of  painting  describe  themselves — the  fact  was 
evident  at  a  glance,  before  scrutiny  discovered 
the  mark  of  the  Roman  Gallery  in  charcoal  on 
their  fingers.  A  greasy  coat,  white  at  the  left 
elbow,  and  frayed  under  the  right  cuff,  confirmed 

1 


2  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

the  impression  that  its  wearer  was  a  hack  from 
the  Reading  Room.  Sometimes  a  reporter  and 
his  note-book  might  be  recognised ;  more  frequent 
was  the  sight  of  a  violin-case,  or  a  roll  of  songs. 
Occasionally  a  denizen  of  the  foreign  quarter 
behind  Tottenham  Court  Road  stumbled  upon 
the  establishment — to  sigh  for  the  forbidden 
cigarette,  and  renew  his  allegiance  to  the  restau- 
rants of  Charlotte  Street;  now  and  again  a  stray 
shop-girl  out  of  employment,  or  an  excursionist 
up  for  the  day,  gaped  at  the  costumes  of  the  com- 
pany— approving  the  cuisine  and  disdaining  the 
clientele.  A  little  woman  with  spectacles  and 
close-cropped  hair  suggested  mathematics;  and 
a  Pole,  whose  unkempt  locks  swept  the  grime  on 
his  velvet  collar,  left  one  in  doubt  whether  to 
attribute  to  him  operas  or  infernal  machines. 

On  a  certain  winter  afternoon,  the  room, 
usually  so  full,  was  deserted  save  by  two  persons. 
One  was  a  man  of  about  thirty;  the  other  was  a 
girl,  five  or  six  years  younger.  Though  they 
had  often  noticed  each  other  there,  they  were 
not  acquaintances,  and  to-day  each  was  at  once 
interested  and  a  shade  embarrassed  by  the  other's 
presence.  When  the  waitress  reappeared  with 
pudding,  the  silence  between  them  had  not  been 
broken,  but  the  man,  stealing  another  glance, 
saw  that  the  girl  was  crying. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  3 

They  were  seated  close  together;  the  room 
contained  three  long  tables,  but  two  of  them  were 
bare,  and  the  cloth  extended  but  half -Way  down 
the  third.  The  preparations  for  custom  had  been 
slight  to-day  at  the  eating-house,  and  of  all  its 
struggling  frequenters,  of  all  its  hopeful  and  its 
hopeless  band,  only  these  two  apparently  had 
had  nowhere  else  to  go.  The  attendant,  who  had 
returned  to  her  chair  behind  the  counter,  con- 
templated them  with  an  air  of  compassionate 
protest.  The  date  was  December  the  twenty- 
fifth. 

He  looked  quickly  away,  out  at  the  dreary 
street.  He  understood  the  tears  that  stood  in 
his  companion's  eyes — if  he  had  been  a  woman, 
his  mood  would  have  required  the  same  relief. 
That,  though,  was  not  his  thought;  the  thought 
of  which  he  was  suddenly  conscious  was  that 
he  wished  the  girl  and  he  knew  each  other.  He 
was  alone,  and  loneliness  had  never  ached  more 
strongly  in  him.  In  fancy  he  had  been  reliving 
his  life,  lingering  at  the  milestones,  and  scenting 
afresh  the  fragrance  of  mornings  passed  away. 
He  remembered  Christmas  at  the  Vicarage — had 
seen  himself  a  child  again  in  his  father's  church. 
The  old  man's  face  and  white  hair  above  the 
pulpit,  and  the  laurel  and  crimson  berries  round 
the  font,  flashed  close — seemed  close  enough  for 


4s  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

him  to  clasp  them.  He  remembered  his  scholar- 
ship, his  joy,  the  moment  when  his  father's  lips 
had  trembled  at  the  news ;  reviewed  his  boyhood 
at  Harrow,  and  his  confidence  at  Oxford.  It 
was  to  be  the  Church  then  for  him,  too.  He 
recalled  the  first  touch  of  indecision;  the  time 
when  the  cry  of  art  within  him  became  insistent ; 
the  night  when  he  announced  the  change  in  his 
intentions.  Under  the  snow  in  the  cemetery  his 
father  lay  now,  beyond  the  reach  of  disappoint- 
ments. Thank  God  the  bond  between  them  had 
never  weakened !  The  long  battle  which  was  still 
unwon  had  been  mentally  refought  since  his 
meagre  breakfast;  and  the  sense  of  solitariness, 
the  longing  for  sympathy  was  acute  as  he  stared 
through  the  window  at  the  empty  street. 

He  spoke  a  second  later : 

"We're  spared  the  outrage  of  a  Christmas 
pudding  made  fashionable  in  a  mould  here.  If 
a  Christmas  plum-pudding's  not  as  round  as  a 
cannon-ball,  it  isn't  a  Christmas  plum-pudding." 

"No,"  she  said.  She  sought  for  a  continuation. 
"And  it  ought  to  be  very  big,"  she  added. 

"With  a  sprig  of  holly  and  blue  flames." 

Momentarily  he  saw  the  Vicarage  again.  If 
Christmas  were  good  for  nothing  else,  it  would 
serve  to  remind  us  we  were  once  innocent  and 
happy,  and  didn't  know  it;  for  everyone  associ- 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  5 

ates  Christmas  more  vividly  with  his  own  child- 
hood than  with  Christ's.  The  girl  did  not  reply 
further ;  she  looked  down  at  her  plate.  The  man 
looked  wistfully  at  the  girl;  and  the  attendant, 
with  a  smothered  yawn,  looked  at  the  clock. 

"I  think  I've  seen  you  here  before,"  said 
Oliphant.  "I  wonder  they're  open  to-day.  I 
was  half  afraid  I  shouldn't  get  any  dinner." 

"It  was  the  same  with  me — I'm  only  in  lodg- 
ings, and "     She  shivered,  and  pinned  her 

jacket  more  closely  across  her  chest. 

"Are  you  cold?" 

"The  fire  isn't  very  Christmassy,  is  it?  Do 
you  know  what  I'm  going  to  do  when  I  get  up? 
I'm  going  to  walk  round  the  Squares  and  look 
into  all  the  dining-rooms  where  hateful  rich 
people  are  having  port  and  walnuts,  and  toasting 
themselves  before  the  most  expensive  coal.  I 
shall  loathe  them  violently." 

"And  then?"  said  Oliphant,  smihng. 

"I  shall  go  home." 

"And  then?" 

"I  shall  howl." 

Though  he  had  not  failed  to  notice  her  previ- 
ously, he  was  surprised  that  he  had  not  noticed 
her  more.  He  regarded  her  with  rising  interest, 
even  with  gratitude.  Her  face,  though  lacking 
in  colour,  had  a  beauty  which  was  accentuated 


6  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

by  the  style  in  which  the  dark  hair  was  worn — 
parted  in  the  centre,  and  waving  loosely  over  her 
brow  and  ears.  Her  eyes  at  first  sight  had  looked 
black,  but  he  saw  now  that  they  were  grey. 

"My  programme  '11  be  as  livery  as  yours,"  he 
said. 

"You've  nowhere  to  go  either?" 

"Oh,  I've  a  large  selection  of  thoroughfares; 
and  I  can  go  home  too.  There's  no  place  like 
home,  and  it's  often  very  fortunate." 

"What  do  you  do?"  she  asked. 

"I'm  an  actor." 

"Are  you?  I  shouldn't  have  guessed  it.  I'm 
an  actress." 

"I  wondered  if  you  were;  I  was  sure  you  acted 
or  sang.    Are  you  playing  anywhere?" 

"I  was  in  the  Independent  Theatre  last  month 
— did  you  go?  I  haven't  done  anything  since 
then;  it's  such  a  bad  time  of  the  year.  I  was 
very  fortunate  to  be  in  the  Independent;  I  was 
playing  at  Ealing,  and  the  Margetsons  saw  me 
and  offered  me  the  engagement.  I  understudied 
Mrs.  Margetson.  If  I  could  have  played 
Hilda!" 

"Oh,  Ibsen  attracts  you?" 

"Well,  I  should  like  to  play  Hilda  Wangel  in 
The  Master  Builder.  I  should  like  to  play  Hilda; 
and  I  long  to  play  Juliet,  and — oh,  I  who  am 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  7 

nobody,  how  I  should  love  to  create  Lucy  Feverel 
on  the  stage  1" 

"You  read  Meredith?" 

"Because  I'm  an  obscure  actress  can't  I  read? 
Oh,  I  know,  I'm  not  surprised  you  stared!  But 
I  might  have  stared  at  you  for  knowing  it  was 
Meredith.  Lucy!  She's  the  nineteenth-century 
Juliet,  isn't  she?  Are  you  one  of  the  enemies  of 
the  Independent,  or  one  of  the  people  who  care 
nothing  about  it?" 

"Neither,"  he  said.  "The  greatest  work  will 
never  appeal  to  the  greatest  number.  How 
should  it?" 

"That's  discouraging!"  She  rested  her  elbows 
on  the  cloth — her  fingers  interlaced,  and  sup- 
porting her  chin — her  eyes  lifted  to  him  atten- 
tively. 

"I  maan  the  greatest  creative  work.  Does  an 
actor  or  an  actress  create?  You  used  the  word, 
but  I'm  afraid  we  don't.  The  best  of  us  interpret 
— like  Paderewski,  Sarasate;  Wagner  creates. 
Shakespeare  created  Hamlet;  the  actor  who 
plays  the  part  tries  to  interpret  his  intention. 
Need  he  be  any  the  less  an  artist  because  the 
nature  of  his  art  demands  collaboration?" 

"His  collaborators  aren't  all  Shakespeares," 
she  said;  "nor  Ibsens." 

"Oh,  there  may  be  more  brains  in  the  actor 


8  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

than  in  the  part  I  What  banalities  are  considered 
seriously  because  he  gives  them  life!" 

"But  good  work  is  knocking  at  the  stage 
doors!"  she  cried;  "why  isn't  it  admitted?  Why 
does  the  actor  put  the  banalities  on?  When  he 
is  his  own  manager,  why  not  produce  things  that 
are  worthy  of  him?" 

"Because  the  best  only  appeals  to  the  minority, 
as  I  say.  If  you  want  a  proof  of  it,  remember 
that  England  claims  the  greatest  dramatic  poet 
the  world  has  known,  and  then  look  down  the 
list  of  the  travelling  companies — see  how  many 
are  playing  his  work!  You  know! — it's  appall- 
ing. Managers  wouldn't  pay  fees  for  trash, 
instead  of  taking  poetry  for  nothing,  if  the 
poetry  drew  as  well;  you  can  be  quite  sure  of 
that;  for  their  ambition  is  to  make  money." 

"Is  it  yours?"  she  asked  impatiently.  "If  you 
were  an  actor-manager,  what  would  you  pro- 
duce?" 

The  attendant  folded  her  novelette,  rose,  and 
came  round  to  the  table. 

"It's  shuttin'  up  time,  please,"  she  said;  "we're 
only  open  to  four  o'clock  to-day."  She  tore  out 
two  vouchers,  and  picked  up  the  coins. 

"I  wish  I  had  spoken  to  you  over  the  soup," 
said  Oliphant,  watching  the  girl  put  on  her 
gloves. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  9 

She  smiled.  "I  was  praying  you  wouldn't 
speak  at  all — I  felt  so  miserable.  But  I  am  glad 
you  did.    Good-bye." 

"Good-bye,"  he  said;  and  she  preceded  him 
down  the  stairs.  "I  won't  wish  you  'a  merry 
Christmas,'  "  he  added,  as  they  reached  the  foot, 
"but  I  hope  it  won't  be  too  wretched.  Are  you 
going  to  take  that  walk  and  'loathe  them 
violently'?" 

"I  think  so — it'll  be  something  to  do." 

She  seemed  undecided  whether  to  extend  her 
hand ;  then  made  as  if  to  offer  it. 

"You  wouldn't  let  me  come  with  you?"  he  said 
hesitatingly;  "I " 

"I  think  not,"  she  said;  "thanks." 

They  stood  on  the  desolate  pavement,  looking 
away  from  each  other.  The  daylight  was  slowly 
fading,  and  on  the  pallor  a  yellow  gas-lamp  leapt 
into  the  perspective. 

"You  don't  mind  my  having  asked  you?  I — I 
meant  no  harm." 

"No,  I  understand,"  she  said;  "but " 

"It  would  lessen  the  awfulness  for  half  an 
hour,"  pleaded  Oliphant.  "I've  no  one  to  talk 
to,  I've  nothing  to  read,  and  it'd  be  a  charity. 
Can't  you  imagine  we've  been  introduced?  Do 
let  me!  .  .  .  Will  you?" 


10  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

She  wavered  for  an  instant.  "For  half  an  hour 
then,"  she  responded.    "Come!" 

"Thank  you  very  much.  Which  way  do  we 
go?" 

"Oh,  the  loneliness  of  London!"  exclaimed  the 
girl  as  they  crossed  the  road;  "the  loneliness  of 
it!"  She  glanced  at  him  and  sighed.  "This  is 
very  improbable,"  she  remarked. 

"Probabilities  aren't  pleasing,"  said  Oliphant. 
"The  greatest  probability  is  that  'the  part  is 
already  cast' !" 

"It's  a  hard  profession  if  one  has  no  influence. 
Have  you  been  in  town?" 

"I've  just  got  my  first  engagement  here.  We 
open  in  about  a  fortnight.  The  Queen's.  I  speak 
twelve  lines.  On  tour  I've  been  playing  good 
parts. 

"How  dreadful!    What  you  must  feel!" 

"I  do.  But  I  couldn't  endure  the  provinces 
for  ever.  I  want  to  get  on ;  I  ought  to  get  on — 
I've  worked  so  hard,  and  hoped  so  long;  it's 
time  I  did  something.  If  I'm  playing  in  Lon- 
don, a  chance  may  be  easier  to  find — in  the  com- 
panies on  tour  one  is  buried.  Don't  you  think 
so?" 

"I've  played  several  small  parts  in  London," 
she  said,  "but  they  have  led  to  no  better  chance 
for  me.    Oh,  I'm  discouraged!    I  haven't  strug- 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  11 

gled  so  long  as  you,  I  daresay;  but  a  girl's 
weaker,  and  I'm  discouraged." 

"Are  you  quite  alone?" 

She  nodded.     "I  lost  my  mother  last  year; 

she  was  all  I  had.    When  she  died,  it "    Her 

voice  quivered,  and  they  strolled  on  in  silence. 
"I  think  it  made  it  crueller,"  she  continued  softly, 
"to  know  that  she  thought  I'd  get  on  better  with- 
out her,  because — because  it  was  my  joy  to  help 
her  as  much  as  I  could  while  she  lived." 

"I  envy  you!"  said  Oliphant;  "all  I  did  was 
to  cause  my  father  pain." 

"Didn't  he  want  you  to  be  an  actor;  is  that 
what  you  mean?    Did  you  quarrel?" 

"He  didn't  quarrel  with  me,  but  he  was  dis- 
appointed. And  he  was  the  best  father  a  man 
ever  had." 

"I  like  you  for  saying  that,"  she  answered. 
"What  did  he  want  you  to  be  ?" 

"What  he  was  himself — a  clergyman." 

"Really?"  she  said  with  surprise ;  "and  you  felt 
you  couldn't?" 

"I  wanted  to,  once.  It  was  as  I  grew  older 
that  my  views  changed.  I  don't  mean  religious 
views  or  anything  like  that — I  simply  felt  that 
my  temperament  forbade  it  and  that  the  stage 
was  the  only  career  possible  for  me.  You  asked 
me  in  there  what  I'd  do  if  I  were  an  actor- 


12  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

manageT.  I  went  into  the  profession  because  I 
loved  it ;  because  it  seemed  to  me  the  stage  might 
teach  as  high  a  lesson  as  the  pulpit — that  it  might 
be  the  loudest,  greatest  voice  in  all  the  world. 
More  powerful  than  the  Church,  because  the 
Church  is  precept  and  the  stage  is  action;  more 
intimate  than  the  sister-arts,  because  it  speaks  in 
a  simpler  tongue.  And  it  should  be  art ;  but  art 
— art  is  revelation!  Shall  I  tell  you  what  my 
dream  is?" 

"Yes,"  said  the  girl  earnestly,  "do;  tell  me 
your  dream!" 

Instinctively  they  had  paused.  They  were  by 
the  pillar-box  at  the  gates  of  the  British  Museum. 
In  the  immense  quietude  theirs  were  the  only 
human  figures ;  the  London  that  gorged,  and  the 
London  that  starved,  were  both  out  of  view. 

"I  see,"  he  said,  "a  small  theatre,  and  at  this 
theatre  the  one  literary  medium  for  the  drama 
isn't  held  to  be  the  baldest  prose ;  poetry  is  neither 
divorced  from  this  stage,  nor  limited  to  Shake- 
speare— it's  thought  possible  to  test  the  work 
of  a  poet  who  has  not  had  centuries  of  advertis- 
ing! But  the  realist  is  as  welcome  as  the  poet; 
I  should  think  he  was  welcome !  Only  the  plays 
are  literature,  and  they  are  real  plays.  The  men 
and  women  live!  They  aren't  puppets  pulled 
by  inexorable  strings  through  four  acts  to  a 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  13 

conventional  end.  Reward  for  virtue  and  pun- 
ishment for  vice  are  shown  to  exist  in  the  soul 
and  not  in  material  success  and  failure.  To 
depict  the  world  as  a  school,  where  virtue  wins 
the  prize,  and  vice  gets  a  flogging,  is  immoral. 
The  parts  around  me  aren't  written  down  to 
bring  my  part  into  greater  prominence.  The 
dramatist  who  comes  to  me  is  free — free  to  be 
true  to  his  convictions  and  his  art ;  free  to  choose 
his  characters  where  he  will,  and  to  trace  their 
legitimate  development;  free  to  make  the  'lost' 
woman  noble,  and  the  'godly'  woman  vile — for 
such  things  are! — and  the  love  within  him  for 
all  humanity  would  point  the  moral  when  it 
needed  pointing.  The  real  playwright  is  your 
real  optimist — your  real  Christ-follower — for  he 
shows  that  sin  doesn't  mean  damnation,  and  that 
there  is  redemption  for  the  pure  in  heart.  The 
one  command  laid  upon  him  is  to  see  things 
nobly — that  his  deeper  vision  shall  help  the 
crowd.  Where  shall  I  find  such  writers?  There 
are  dramatists  not  known,  and  well-known 
writers  who  could  write  much  better.  By  degrees 
I  gather  round  me  a  band  of — of  the  times  bien 

nees,  the — how  shall  I  say  it? — the " 

"The  elect  I"  she  put  in  rapidly;  "yes,  I  under- 
stand French.  It  would  be  a  good  name  for  the 
house— The  Elect!" 


14  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"I  produce  men  who  don't  work  for  the  stage 
now,  or  whose  manuscripts  are  considered  hope- 
less because  they  don't  appeal  to  the  largest 
public.  With  a  small  theatre  I  could  afford  to 
depend  upon  the  educated  minority.  There  is  a 
Press  waiting  for  such  an  endeavour,  and,  though 
at  first  the  notices  are  bigger  than  the  returns, 
they  gradually  win  for  me  the  recognition  of 
all  the  public  that  I'm  addressing.  Believe  me 
that  public  is  large  enough  to  keep  my  house 
open  all  the  year  round.  Miss er — my  com- 
panion in  misfortune,  my  theatre  becomes  a 
force  in  intellectual  London;  I'm  famous,  happy, 
I  have  fulfilled  my  ambition,  I'm  the  manager 
of  the — the  Theatre  Royal  Day-dream.  .  .  .  I've 
been  keeping  you  standing  still  in  the  cold;  for- 
give me!" 

She  caught  her  breath.  "You're  an  artist," 
she  said,  "I  believe  you'll  succeed.  This  is  one 
of  the  moments  when  I  think  that  to  be  an  artist 
and  fail,  is  something." 

"We  are  both  artists,"  he  said;  "The  Two 
Bohemians!" 

"I  haven't  told  you  my  name.  It's  Alma 
King." 

"I'm  so  glad  we  met,  Miss  King.  Mine's 
Royce  Oliphant.  You  see  the  benefit  of  giving 
a  thing  a  trial — we  couldn't  know  each  other 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  15 

better  if  the  formal  introduction  had  taken  place. 
Now  could  we?" 

"Look!"  she  murmured,  halting  again  in  two 
or  three  minutes. 

He  glanced  at  the  window  that  she  indicated. 
"Ah,  the  opportunity  for  the  violent  loath- 
ing!" 

"No,  only  for  the  imagination  after  all.  How 
torpid  they  look  after  their  dinner!  But  it's 
cosy  in  the  firelight,  isn't  it?  I  wonder  what 
they  do — one  can't  see  their  features?  Trade,  of 
course.  Trade  in  saddlebag  armchairs  digests 
the  turkey,  and  art  in  the  streets  builds  castles 
in  the  air.    Observe  the  adipose  children !" 

"Their  figures  aren't  distinguishable." 

"I  feel  they're  adipose — I  told  you  this  was 
an  exercise  of  the  imagination.  Oh,  the  servant 
has  come  to  pull  the  blinds  down!  The  enter- 
tainment is  over.  I  don't  think  we'll  look  in 
anywhere  else — other  people's  comfort  is  very 
saddening." 

They  waited  there,  by  the  area  railings,  in 
Bedford  Square,  nevertheless,  till  the  last  of  the 
blinds  was  lowered.  Illuminated,  the  interior 
had  a  fascination — the  group  on  the  hearth,  and 
the  gleam  of  decanters  under  the  crimson  shade 
above  the  damask;  the  glinting  picture-frames, 
and  the  splendour  of  a  Christmas-tree.    Mean- 


16  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

while  on  "The  Two  Bohemians"  a  little  snow 
began  to  fall. 

"You  must  go  home,"  said  Oliphant  regret- 
fully.   "Do  you  live  far  away?" 

"No,  close,"  she  said;  "in  Alfred  Place.  And 
fou?" 

"In  Burton  Crescent." 

"Oh,  how  wet  you'll  get!  You'd  better  leave 
toe  here;  it's  coming  down  more  heavily." 

"Nonsense!  I'll  see  you  to  your  door.  We 
go  through  Store  Street,  don't  we?" 

They  hastened  their  steps,  but  both  were  sorry 
that  the  end  had  come ;  to  each  of  them  the  pros- 
pect of  the  evening  looked  unutterably  dismal. 

"I  suppose  I  may  see  you  at  dinner  again?" 
asked  Oliphant,  as  they  turned  by  the  little  post- 
office  at  the  corner.  "Have  you  any  regular 
time?" 

"About  two,  as  a  rule." 

"Shall  you  be  there  to-morrow?" 

"I  don't  know,"  she  said,  stopping;  "perhaps. 
This  is  the  house." 

"Good-bye,  then,"  said  Oliphant,  "and  thank 
you  again.  I  won't  keep  you  standing  in  a  snow- 
storm to  listen  to  pretty  speeches,  but  I'm  grate- 
ful to  you.  I  should  like  to  think  we're  going  to 
be  friends." 

She  drew  out  a  latch-key,  and  faced  him  for  a 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  17 

moment  with  steadfast  eyes.  Then  quite  simply 
she  said: 

"I  want  you  to  come  in,  Mr.  Oliphant,  please; 
and  we'll  have  some  tea." 

She  opened  the  door;  and,  delighted,  he 
followed  her  along  the  dark  passage,  into  a  room 
to  which  she  led  the  way.  The  fire  was  low,  and 
it  was  not  until  she  had  lighted  the  lamp  that 
Oliphant  perceived  that  she  was  compelled  to 
make  shift  with  one  room  only.  The  asperities 
of  bed  and  washhand-stand,  however,  were  molli- 
fied by  a  shabby  screen.  He  chose  a  seat  where 
they  would  be  behind  him,  and  noted  the  resem- 
blance between  the  broken  vases  on  her  mantel- 
piece and  those  on  his  own.  A  framed  photo- 
graph was  among  the  vases,  and  the  girl  took  it 
up  and  showed  it  to  him. 

"This  was  a  likeness  of  my  mother,  Mr. 
Oliphant,"  she  said. 

The  dignity  of  the  action  thrilled  him  with 
pleasure  and  respect;  he  felt  that  she  could  not 
have  done  anything  more  beautiful. 

She  removed  her  jacket  and  gloves,  and,  kneel- 
ing on  the  hearth,  coaxed  the  fire  into  a  blaze. 

"Are  you  very  wet?"  she  sa?d.  "As  soon  as 
the  kettle  boils,  things  '11  be  more  cheerful.  I 
wait  on  myself  very  much  here — I  find  it  better  " 

"Have  you  been  here  long?" 


18  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"No;  only  since  the  Independent  perform- 
ances— nearly  two  months.  It  isn't  very  com- 
fortable, but  ...  I  shall  move  when  I  get  an- 
other engagement.  In  the  meanwhile  I  have  to 
put  up  with  it."  She  pulled  the  pin  from  her 
hat,  and  passed  her  slim  hands  over  her  hair. 

"You  are  looking  at  my  'library' !  It's  modest, 
isn't  it?" 

"I  can  only  see  the  titles  of  two-thirds  of  the 
library,"  he  said;  "The  Works  of  Shakespeare, 
and  Archer's  Masks  or  Faces — you  know  your 
Masks  or  Faces,  do  you!  What  is  the  little 
one?" 

"The  little  one  is  ninepennyworth  of  Brown- 
ing. I'm  studying  Any  Wife  to  Any  Husband — 
because  I  shall  never  in  my  life  be  given  an 
opportunity  to  recite  it." 

"Recite  it  now,"  said  Oliphant. 

"No,  thank  you.  But  what  a  recitation  it 
would  make !  I  don't  know  why  no  woman  ever 
does  it.  Ah,  it's  lovely — isn't  it  divine!  Do  you 
read  much?  But  of  course  you  do.  I  wonder 
if  you've  ever  tried  to  write?" 

"What  makes  you  ask  that?" 

"Have  you?" 

"Once." 

"A  play?"  she  exclaimed. 

"Oh,  yes;  a  play,  of  course." 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  19 

"It  hasn't  been  produced,  I  suppose? — Oh, 
how  rude  that  sounds!" 

"The  assumption's  correct.  It  has  been  ac- 
cepted three  times,  but  has  not  been  produced. 
It's  in  an  agent's  hands  now;  and  I  suppose  it 
will  stay  there — unless  he  loses  it.    It's  a  drama." 

"Good?"  she  inquired,  settling  the  kettle 
afresh. 

"Z  thought  it  was  very  good.  So  did  every-1 
body  else  who  read  it — only  nobody  puts  it  on. 
Your  kettle  won't  sing!  Isn't  that  what  you 
call  it — 'singing'?  Shall  I  draw  up  the  fire  for 
you  with  that  newspaper?" 

"The  water  was  cold,"  she  said;  "it'll  be  all 
right  in  a  minute.  I'll  ring  for  a  second  cup  and 
saucer.    Tell  me  about  your  drama." 

"The  idea — the  foundation-stone  at  least — is 
a  shade  melodramatic,  perhaps;  but  the  theme 
doesn't  make  a  play  melodrama  if  there's  no 
bombast  in  the  treatment?" 

"I  don't  know,"  she  said;  "but  even  if  it  does, 
mightn't  a  melodrama  without  bombast  be  as 
much  art  as  anything  else?  'The  great  future 
for  the  stage  lies  in  perfect  freedom:  freedom 
to  try  every  kind  of  experiment — to  be  realistic 
or  idealistic,  prosaic  or  fantastic,  "well  made" 
or  plotless;  freedom  to  go  anywhere,  like  the 
British  Army,  and  do  anything.'    Have  I  a  quick 


20  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

study? — I've  only  read  the  book  once.  What 
is  the  foundation-stone?" 

"It  was  suggested  by  the  Tichborne  Case. 
Life,  of  course!  But  so  many  phases  of  life 
become  melodrama  when  they're  transferred  to 
the  stage." 

The  bell  drew  from  the  basement  a  seven-year- 
old  child  with  wooden  eyes,  and  fat  unhealthy 
cheeks.  Jam  and  mince-pie  clung  to  his  chin, 
and  he  snored. 

"Will  you  ask  your  mother  to  let  me  have 
another  cup  and  saucer,  Norman?"  said  the 
lodger  deprecatingly.  "Say  I've  a  friend  here. 
.  .  .  We  shall  have  it  directly,"  she  continued, 
as  the  child  shuffled  out,  "and  then  you  must  tell 
me  the  plot." 

They  sat  opposite  each  other  on  the  narrow 
hearth.  Momentarily  the  dramatist  was  as 
strong  as  the  actor  in  Oliphant,  and  the  play  for 
which  he  had  hoped  so  much  three  years  ago 
moved  him  to  confidence  again.  The  girl,  her 
hands  clasped  loosely  round  her  knee,  leant  for- 
ward, stirred  by  visions  in  which  a  mighty  theatre 
hung  upon  her  voice  and  the  conquest  of  London 
was  achieved.  Both  turned  at  a  peremptory 
knock,  and  started  as  the  door  was  thrown  open. 

The  demeanour  of  the  woman  who  stood  on 
the  threshold  was  as  excited  as  her  method  of 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  21 

announcing  herself.  Her  face  was  white,  and 
when  she  began  to  speak  she  trembled. 

"This  is  pretty  goings-on,"  she  said;  "this 
won't  do  'ere !  I  don't  'ave  it,  and  that's  all  about 
it."  She  turned  to  Oliphant.  "I'll  trouble  you 
to  leave  the  'ouse.    Now  then!" 

"Mrs.  Imms!"  stammered  the  girl,  as  white 
as  she. 

"My  good  woman,"  exclaimed  Oliphant  hor- 
ribly distressed,  "what  do  you  mean?     I  assure 

you There  isn't  the   slightest  reason  for 

you  to  be  annoyed.  I've  the  honour  to  be  a  friend 
of  Miss  King's  and  she  was  kind  enough  to  ask 
me  in  for  half  an  hour.  I  shouldn't  have  thought 
there  was  anything  extraordinary  about  it  on 
Christmas  Day?" 

The  householder  did  not  seem  to  understand, 
or  to  hear  him. 

"You'd  best  be  off,"  she  repeated,  "and  so  I 
tell  yer!  This  is  a  respectable  'ouse — not  meant 
for  the  likes  of  'er!  Yes,  you  I'm  talkin'  about — 
yer  thing;  you  as  don't  pay  your  rent!  I  might 
'ave  told  what  it'd  be  when  I  found  you  was  an 
actress — I'd  never  'ave  taken  you  if  I'd  known!" 

"You — ignorant — wretch!"  gasped  the  girl, 
steadying  herself  by  the  mantelpiece.  "Go,"  she 
added  to  Oliphant;  "please,  go!" 

"The  woman's  been  drinking,"  he  said  in  a 


22  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

low  voice;  "do  you  want  me  to  leave  you  to  her?" 

"Yes,  please! — Please!"  she  murmured  agi- 
tatedly. 

"Aha!'*  cried  Mrs.  Imms;  "and  you  go  with 
'im,  that's  more!  I  won't  keep  you  no  longer. 
Out  you  go!  I'll  'ave  your  box  for  what  it's 
worth,  and  you  don't  sleep  in  my  'ouse,  not  an- 
other night!" 

Oliphant  looked  sharply  round;  but  the  mute 
appeal  forbade  his  lingering.  The  uproar  con- 
tinued as  he  traversed  the  passage — still  in  dark- 
ness— and  fumbled  with  the  handles  at  the  end. 

The  street  opened  upon  him  quiet  and  bleak. 
The  snow  had  ceased,  but  the  wind  blew  bitterly. 
He  hated  himself  for  having  gone  in,  though  he 
could  not  perceive  where  he  had  been  at  fault. 
The  woman's  threat  to  turn  the  girl  out  of  doors 
was  in  his  ears,  and  weighed  on  his  consciousness. 
Impossible  that  he  could  leave  unless  satisfied 
that  it  wasn't  to  be  fulfilled!  He  made  a 
cigarette,  lit  it,  and  sauntered  to  and  fro,  debat- 
ing how  long  a  vigil  was  demanded  to  dispel  all 
doubt. 

His  capital  was  reduced  to  eighteen  shillings 
and  a  few  pence;  his  prospects  were  represented 
by  the  engagement  at  the  Queen's  Theatre,  of 
which  he  had  spoken;  an  engagement  which 
would  provide  him  with  the  sum  of  two  pounds 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  23 

d  week — less  than  half  the  salary  that  he  had  been 
receiving  in  the  provinces.  If  it  had  been  other- 
wise     He  sighed.    He  reflected  that  it  would 

have  been  a  luxury  to  pay  the  amount  of  Mrs. 
Imms's  claim  and  send  Miss  King  to  an  hotel 
where  she  could  dine  in  reality  before  she  slept, 
and  have  a  respite  from  her  cares.  Yes,  that 
would  have  been  delightful.  Did  rich  men  have 
these  pleasures?  Or  did  the  opportunities  fall 
only  to  men  like  himself,  who  couldn't  seize  them? 

His  cigarette  was  finished;  he  paused  by  a 
lamp-post,  and  tried,  with  numbed  fingers,  to 
roll  another.  Now  she  would  regret  that  she  had 
met  him — the  oasis  in  the  desert  of  their  London 
had  proved  a  misfortune  to  her !  Who  could  have 
foreseen  that  it  would  have  so  serious  a  develop- 
ment? All  the  same,  she  would  always  recall 
it  with  abhorrence — that  was  only  human  nature. 
.  .  .  But  perhaps  in  the  morning  the  landlady 
would  apologise.  He  threw  a  glance  at  the  house 
again,  and  ran  forward  as  a  figure  appeared  on 
the  doorstep. 

"You?"  faltered  the  girl,  shrinking. 

"I  couldn't  go  till  I  knew,"  he  said.  "Are  you 
going  away?" 

"Yes,  don't — don't  trouble,  thanks.  It  was 
good  of  you  to  wait,  but  there's  nothing  you  can 
do  "     Her  tone  was  hard;  but  it  could  not  con- 


24.  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

ceal  that  there  were  tears  in  her  throat.  She 
looked  away  from  him. 

"Haven't  you  your  luggage?" 

"She  wouldn't  let  me  take  it.    You  see,  I 

You  understand,  I  owe  her  money — she  has  kept 
my  things.    I  have  these." 

"She  hasn't  the  right,"  cried  Oliphant,  wincing 
at  the  handbag;  "I'll  make  her  give  them  up !" 

"No,  no!  don't  go  back — I'd  rather  you  didn't; 
I  shall  manage  somehow.  .  .  .  Don't  let  me  keep 
you  any  longer,"  she  repeated;  "there's  nothing 
you  can  do." 

"I've  done  enough !"  said  the  man  poignantly. 
"I  know!" 

"You  mustn't  think  that.  You've  nothing  to 
reproach  yourself  for — if  any  one  is  to  blame,  it's 
I."  The  restraint  that  she  was  putting  on  herself 
gave  way:  "You're  the  only  living  soul  I've  had 
to  speak  to  for  two  months !"  she  exclaimed,  with 
a  hoarse  sob.  "Don't  think  badly  of  me  if  I 
made  a  mistake." 

He  wished  he  were  a  woman  that,  for  answer, 
he  might  take  her  in  his  arms;  he  could  but  ex- 
press his  sympathy  and  comprehension  by  halting 
words.  His  poverty  had  never  seemed  so  great  a 
shackle  as  while  they  stood  there,  helpless  on  the 
pavement — the  only  sound,  a  bell  that  rang  for 
evening  service  at  some  neighbouring  church. 


CHAPTER  II 

"What  do  you  mean  to  do?"  inquired  Oli- 
phant  after  a  brief  pause.  "You  can't  go  to  one 
of  these  houses  on  Christmas  night,  without  any 
luggage,  and  expect  to  get  a  room." 

"No,  I've  thought  of  that — I  don't  know  yet 
where  I  shall  go.  There's  a  place  where  I  stayed 
when  my  mother  was  living — the  woman  would 
remember  me.  If  it  didn't  mean  a  bus  fare  every 
day,  I'd  try  there." 

"Where  is  it?" 

"It's  at  Shepherd's  Bush.  Are  the  trains  run- 
ning this  evening,  do  you  know?" 

"I  daresay — you'll  let  me  take  you,  if  you  go? 
I  can't  lose  sight  of  you  till  I  know  you're  settled. 
But  how  can  you  look  for  an  engagement,  if 
you're  hard  up,  from  Shepherd's  Bush — you 
can't  walk  to  the  Strand?  Besides,  the  house 
may  be  full;  or  perhaps  the  woman  is  dead.  If 
she's  alive,  I  suppose  she'll  want  to  be  paid,  like 
everybody  else,  won't  she?"  he  added. 

"I  must  get  enough  for  the  first  week  some- 
25 


26  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

how,"  she  declared,  sauntering  on;  "and  then 
she  must  trust  me,  or  I  must  give  the  room  up." 

"Look  here,"  said  Oliphant  desperately,  "we 
haven't  known  each  other  two  hours,  of  course; 
and  I  can  see  you're  as  proud  as  Lucifer.  But 
I'm  going  to  be  as  frank  as  if  you  were  my  sister : 
I've  eighteen  shillings — and  fourpence-half- 
penny,  I  think  it  is — in  the  world.  I  wouldn't 
tell  many  people  that,  so  I've  a  right  to  ask  for 
your  friendship  in  return.  Let  me  lend  you  half 
a  sovereign  till  you  get  an  engagement." 

"Oh  no,"  she  said  under  her  breath.  "No, 
thank  you !" 

"You  won't?  How  can  you  be  so  unkind — so 
— so  absurd?  What's  to  prevent  it?  Isn't  it  any 
good?    Or  don't  you  respect  me  sufficiently?" 

"Oh,"  she  said,  "that " 

"Don't  you  like  me  enough?  You  know  we've 
been  more  confidential  than  many  acquaintances 
of  years'  standing:  you're  refusing  because  it's 
strange  that  we  should  have  grown  so  confiden- 
tial in  two  hours.  That's  unworthy  of  a  woman 
with  a  mind  like  yours!  ...  I  wish  you  would 
do  what  I  ask,  and  let  me  get  your  luggage  for 
you  to-morrow.  Do  you  propose  to  let  that  beast 
keep  it  till  you  can  pay  her?" 

"I  must  think  what  to  do  about  my  trunk," 
she  said. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  27 

"And  the — it's  a  big  word  for  a  silly  sum — the 
loan'?" 

"Thank  you,  'no'!  Really  and  truly  'no'!  I 
appreciate  what  you've  said  very  much;  but  be 
tactful — and  don't  say  any  more." 

"Very  well,"  he  returned.  "Now  where  are 
you  going?" 

"I'm  afraid  Shepherd's  Bush  is  too  far,"  she 
sighed;  "and,  as  you  say,  the  woman  mayn't  be 
there  now." 

"Where  did  you  stay  before  you  went  to 
Alfred  Place?"  ' 

"I  was  on  tour.  .  .  .  Last  year  I  had  apart- 
ments in  Keppel  Street ;  but  those  'd  be  too  dear." 
Her  pace  slackened  to  a  standstill,  and  she  turned 
impatiently:  "Please  don't  trouble  any  more! 
There's  not  the  least  necessity  for  you  to  go 
through  all  this  as  well." 

"For  the  first  time  I'm  compelled  to  differ 
from  you,"  said  the  young  man;  "I  think  there's 
every  necessity." 

"Well,  I'd  rather  you  went,"  she  insisted; 
"you'll  oblige  me  by  saying  good-night." 

"I'm  very  sorry,  indeed;  but  as  things  stand, 
I  don't  see  my  way  to  leaving  you." 

His  decisive  tone  stung  her  helplessness  to 
anger. 

"Do  you  mean  to  say  you  won't  go  when  I 


28  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

wish  it?"  she  exclaimed  haughtily.  "I  forbid 
you  to  come  with  me,  I  prefer  to  be  by  myself." 
She  stood  looking  in  his  face,  her  air  as  imperious 
as  her  words.  Oliphant  had  not  realised  till  now 
that  she  was  so  tall.  "I  forbid  you!"  she  re- 
peated.   "I  want  to  be  alone." 

"There's  one  way  you  can  get  rid  of  me,"  he 
said.  "Here's  a  policeman  coming;  you  can 
charge  me  with  annoying  you.  I'll  be  hanged 
if  I'll  leave  you  to  wander  about  London  alone, 
unless  you  do!" 

The  policeman  approached  ponderously,  his 
gaze  attentive.  The  girl  resumed  her  course,  and 
Oliphant  turned  beside  her.  When  she  spoke 
again,  her  voice  had  no  resentment,  and  it  quiv- 
ered: 

"I  want  to  beg  your  pardon.  I  was  ungrate- 
ful.   I'm  ashamed  of  myself." 

"Oh,  please,  Miss  King!"  he  stammered.  "I 
understand  so  well." 

"It  was  only  because  I'm  so  miserable." 

"I  know.  .  .  .  Will  you  let  me  suggest  a  way 
out  of  the  difficulty?" 

"Oh,  please  do!"  she  cried. 

"Take  a  room  in  the  house  where  I'm  staying 
— for  a  day  or  two  at  all  events.  The  landlady's 
a  good  sort,  and  it's  very  cheap,  or  I  shouldn't 
be  there!     It  will  avoid  all  bother  about  your 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  29 

having  no  luggage,  and  about  a  deposit,  and  the 
rest  of  it;  and  you  can  be  'at  home'  in  a  quarter 
of  an  hour."  She  was  silent  for  a  long  while.  "I 
told  you  just  now  I  was  going  to  be  as  frank  as 
if  you  were  my  sister,"  he  continued.  "If  you 
were,  and  another  man  gave  you  such  honest 
advice,  I  should  want  to  find  him  afterwards  and 
thank  him!" 

"Which  is  our  way  to  Burton  Crescent?"  she 
said  cheerfully;  "I  forget."  Oliphant  glanced 
at  her  with  admiration. 

By  the  clock  at  St.  Pancras  it  was  five  minutes 
to  six  as  they  drew  near  the  house;  they  were 
now  walking  briskly.  Oliphant  unlocked  the 
door,  and  letting  Alma  in,  went  to  the  top  of  the 
kitchen-stairs. 

"Mrs.  Tubbs!"  he  called.  "Mrs.  Tubbs,  can 
I  speak  to  you  for  a  moment?" 

A  buxom  little  woman  with  rosy  cheeks  and 
untidy  grey  hair  bustled  up  to  him. 

"You've  got  back  then?"  she  exclaimed.  "I 
thought  p'raps  you  was  spending  the  evening 
with  your  friends  after  all." 

"No,"  he  said;  "I've  brought  one  to  you,  in- 
stead. There's  a  lady  in  the  hall — Miss  King — 
who  wants  a  room." 

"That  there  isn't!"  said  Mrs.  Tubbs;  "you're 
joking." 


30  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"I'm  not ;  she  meant  to  sleep  in  Alfred  Place ; 

in  fact,  her  luggage  is  there,  but Well,  I 

know  the  house  isn't  very  nice,  Mrs.  Tubbs,  be- 
tween ourselves,  and  I  persuaded  her  to  come 
here.  Mind!  it's  got  to  be  cheap  and  'inclusive' 
— no  more  than  you  charge  me." 

"I'm  sure,  Miss,  I  'ope  we  shall  make  you 
comfortable,"  murmured  the  landlady,  panting 
along  the  passage.  "We're  in  a  bit  of  a  muddle, 
you  know,  along  of  Christmas  Day  and  the  girl 
out,  but  I  can  soon  get  the  room  to  rights  for 
you.    Would  you  like  to  see  it,  Miss  ?" 

"Please,"  said  Alma. 

"Bless  me,  I'm  forgetting  the  candle!  I 
couldn't  very  well  show  it  you  in  the  dark,  could 
I  ?  Here,  Amelia,  Johnny,  one  of  you !  bring  me 
a  candle,  quick!  In  the  prerfession,  Miss,  the 
same  as  Mr.  Elephant,  may  I  ask?  Have  you 
come  up  to  London  for  long?" 

"Yes,  I'm  an  actress,"  said  the  girl;  "I  don't 
quite  know  how  long  I  shall  be  staying.  I'm 
sorry  to  put  you  to  any  trouble  to-day." 

"Oh,  don't  talk  about  'trouble,'  Miss;  where 
there  ain't  no  trouble  there  ain't  no  let!  I'm 
sure  it  was  fortunate  as  Mr.  Elephant  thought 
to  bring  you.  It'll  be  awkward  your  not  'aving 
your  things  with  you,  won't  it?  But  there!  I 
dessay  you'll  make  shift  for  the  night." 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  31 

Oliphant  remained  in  the  passage  till  the 
arrangement  was  concluded  and  Alma  and  the 
householder  reappeared. 

"You've  settled?"  he  inquired.  "Is  it  all 
right?" 

"It's  quite  all  right,"  answered  Miss  King 
brightly:  "I'm  glad  I  came!" 

"And  if  there's  anything  you'd  fancy,  Miss," 
said  Mrs.  Tubbs,  beaming,  "I'll  soon  'ave  it  up. 
A  cup  o'  tea  and  a  bit  o'  goose  now?" 

"I  think  we  should  like  tea  at  last,"  said 
Oliphant,  "if  you  can  manage  it." 

"If  I  can  manage  it!"  she  echoed.  "Go  on 
with  you!  There  never  was  such  a  gentleman, 
Miss,  for  fearin'  to  put  anybody  out.  Your  fire's 
in,  Mr.  Elephant,  though  I  was  just  beginning  to 
think  I  wouldn't  make  it  up  again,  as  more  than 
likely  your  friends  was  keeping  you." 

"I  wish  they  would,  Mrs.  Tubbs,"  he  said. 
"Well,  I  expect  Miss  King  will  be  glad  to  sit 
down!" 

"What  'friends'?"  asked  Alma,  as  they 
mounted  to  the  first  floor.  "I  thought  you  said 
you'd  nowhere  to  go?" 

"I  hadn't;  but  I  didn't  like  to  own  it  to  her. 
She  thought  I'd  gone  to  dine  with  some  relations. 
What  have  you  seen?" 

"I've  seen  my  room.    It  will  do  very  well." 


32  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"Well,  I'll  show  you  some  more,"  he  said. 
"Enter!" 

He  displayed  a  drawing-room.  It  was  not 
luxurious,  but  it  boasted  a  high  mirror  over  the 
mantel-shelf,  and  a  sideboard  supporting  an- 
other. The  furniture  was  upholstered  in  bright 
blue  rep,  and  the  fire  leapt  cheerfully. 

"Is  this  yours?"  she  exclaimed,  astonished. 

"Oh  no!  'Mine'  is  a  bedroom  the  size  of  a  cup- 
board. But  I  pay  eight  shillings  a  week,  and  it 
affords  me  the  'use'  of  this,  and  tea  and  toast 
twice  a  day.  The  goose  this  evening  will  be  an 
'extra.'  " 

"Do  you  mean " 

"I  mean  that  you,  like  me,  are  entitled  to  come 
in  here  as  often  as  you  please — our  terms  include 
the  'use  of  sitting-room.'  At  present  we  are  the 
only  lodgers — and  Mrs.  Tubbs  and  the  children 
have  a  parlour  in  the  basement.  You  may  sit 
here  from  pearly  morn  to  dewy  eve.  Or  you 
may  shun  it  absolutely  if  you  choose.  If  you 
have  a  preference  for  solitude,  you  can  appro- 
priate the  dining-room.  Only  you  won't  find  a 
fire  in  there:  I  buy  these  coals  myself — a  hun- 
dred-weight at  a  time,  for  a  shilling.  If  you 
eventually  decide  upon  the  drawing-room,  I 
think  it  would  be  honourable  if  you  owed  me 
sixpence." 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  33 

She  laughed.    "It's  extraordinary!'* 

"It  is.  But  it  happens  to  be  a  fact;  I  have 
practically  the  whole  house.  However,  I'm  will- 
ing to  resign  half  of  it  to  you  if  you  want  me 
to.    Into  the  dining-room  I  will  never  stray." 

"This  evening,"  said  Miss  King,  "I  will  share 
the  responsibility  of  the  'hundred-weight.'  I'll 
go  and  take  off  my  hat." 

Oliphant  stretched  himself  in  an  armchair,  and 
mechanically  rolled  a  cigarette,  and  threw  it 
away. 

"Let  me,"  he  said,  when  she  returned,  "show 
you  the  extent  of  your  possessions !  These  win- 
dows open  on  to  a  balcony,  where  Mrs.  Tubbs 
assures  me  it  is  pleasant  to  sit  in  summer.  Not 
having  been  here  in  summer,  I  cannot  vouch  for 
it  personally.  Beyond,  lie  beautiful  pleasure- 
grounds  enclosed  by  railings — the  use  of  the 
necessary  key  is  also  yours.  To  our  left  we  have 
Marchmont  Street — on  Saturday  night  a  busy 
thoroughfare;  stalls  illumined  by  naptha  may 
be  found  here;  and  the  costermongers  cry: 
'Fine  'errings!  Where  yer  like,  laidies — three 
a  penny!'  To  our  right  are  various  railway- 
stations,  much  resorted  to  by  such  of  the  popula- 
tion as  are  desirous  of  going  somewhere  else. 
Behind  us,  if  I'm  not  mistaken,  is  Mrs.  Tubbs 
with  cold  goose!" 


84  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

They  turned  to  the  table,  and  Mrs.  Tubbs  said : 

"Well,  it  'ave  cheered  Mr.  Elephant  up  to 
meet  an  old  friend,  Miss,  I  must  say.  I  haven't 
'eard  'im  talk  so  much  since  'e's  been  here.  Might 
I  ask  if  you'll  be  taking  a  part  at  any  of  the 
theatres,  Miss  ?  I  ain't  in  the  prerf ession  myself, 
but  I'm  that  interested  in  it,  having  'ad  a  niece 
as  took  to  the  stage — which  her  name  was  Billing, 
and  she  called  herself  'Clarence,'  and  pretty  she 
was! — going  against  her  father's  wishes,  having 
quarrelled  with  him,  and  not  my  pore  'usband's 
or  mine — though  us  it  was  that  she  always  blamed 
for  spoilin'  her  prospecks — well,  I  sometimes 
seem  to  be  as  good  as  an  actress  in  a  manner  of 
speaking,  though  I'm  not." 

"I'm  not  in  an  engagement  now,"  said  Alma; 
"I  hope  I  shall  be  before  long." 

"No,  Miss.  I  'ope  you'll  find  the  tea  strong 
enough.  She  was  before  your  time,  Miss,  and — 
ah,  well,  she's  gone  now,  pore  dear,  like  Tubbs 
himself — though  there  was  a  coldness  between 
'em  to  the  day  of  her  death.  And  pretty  she  was. 
And  might  have  been  at  the  Al'ambra  still  but 
for  her  father's  artfulness!" 

"Her  father  didn't  approve,"  said  Oliphant; 
"and  Mr.  Tubbs  urged  her  to  try  dressmaking 
instead." 

"Mr.   Tubbs  was  the  tool  of  Mr.   Billing," 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  35 

explained  the  widow  strenuously.  "Mr.  Tubbs 
he  approved.  Me  and  him  was  both  very  proud 
to  see  the  girl  famous-an'-that.  It  was  'er  father 
as  made  the  to-do  and  put  'im  up  to  interfere — 
though  as  fond  of  'er  as  if  she'd  been  'is  own — 
and  speaking  that  'arsh  she  never  forgot  it.  Mr. 
Tubbs  was  the  tool  of  Mr.  Billing." 

"I've  no  doubt  she  realised  it,  Mrs.  Tubbs," 
said  Alma;  "she  probably  felt  it  in  her  own 
mind." 

"I  'ope  she  did,  pore  dear,  that  I  do!  But 
lor,  it'd  never  do  to  think  too  much  about  these 
things,  would  it?  Is  there  anything  else  you 
fancy,  Miss,  or  Mr.  Elephant,  sir?  If  you  want 
any  more  hot  water  you'll  just  touch  the  bell." 

"That's  quite  all,  Mrs.  Tubbs,  thank  you,"  he 
said;  "we  shan't  want  anything  else.  Come!" 
he  went  on,  as  she  withdrew;  "was  my  recom- 
mendation so  bad?  There's  character  for  you! 
It's  'Mrs.  Willoughby'  over  again;  still  she's  a 
study.  .  .  .  What  are  you  considering?" 

"That  I  thought  it  startling  to  be  crossing  the 
road  with  you  this  afternoon.  And  behold  me 
now!" 

"A  piece  more  toast?"  he  said,  passing  the 
plate.  "You  evidently  don't  read  much  fiction, 
or  you'd  know  that  the  distracted  heroine  finding 
peace  in  the  stranger's  rooms  is  the  most  ordinary 


36  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

thing  in  the  world.  It's  true  this  ought  to  be 
a  handsome  flat,  or,  at  least,  chambers  in  the 
Temple,  but  the  situation  is  stale — absolutely." 

"Talking  of  situations,"  she  replied,  "you  must 
tell  me  the  story  of  your  play.  And  the  curtain's 
going  up,  and  you  haven't  given  me  the  title !" 

"The  title  is  The  Impostor"  said  Oliphant 
slowly.  "The  curtain  rises  on  the  hall  of  a 
country  house — the  house  of  the  Countess  of 
Plynlimmon.  At  the  back  there's  a  staircase 
leading  to  an  oak  gallery.  She  and  two  other 
women  are  on  the  stage — all  seated.  Logs  are 
burning  in  the  grate — twilight's  gathering — the 
women  have  been  half -asleep;  it's  just  before 
tea.  I  try  to  convey  the  drowsiness  and  warmth 
of  the  moment — it  opens  very  naturally.  Lady 
Plynlimmon's  nephew  lounges  in;  Lady  Maud 
Elstree,  her  daughter,  enters.  The  dialogue 
turns  on  a  guest  there,  Sir  Clement  Thurloe. 
Fourteen  years  before,  he  cut  the  Guards  and 
disappeared;  everyone  believed  him  dead.  Now 
he  has  returned — causing  an  immense  sensation 
— and  established  his  identity.  Excuses  are  made 
for  his  youthful  wildness,  and  Society  receives 
him  with  open  arms.  He  is  reported  to  have  been 
everything  in  the  interval,  from  a  sheep-farmer 
to  a  sailor  before  the  mast.  When  the  men  return 
— they've  been  hunting,  they're  in  'pink' — he  is, 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  37 

of  course,  the  central  figure.  He  speaks  to  Maud 
diffidently;  with  everyone  else  he  is  at  his  ease, 
though  he  refers  to  his  unfamiliarity  with  a 
drawing-room.  It's  shown  that  he  is  in  love  with 
her,  and  that  her  mother  hopes  to  see  her  marry 
him." 

"Is  'Maud'  a  good  part?"  inquired  the  actress. 

"Yes,  as  good  as  his,  I  think.  You  would 
look  it  magnificently.  It  isn't  until  the  act  is 
nearly  over  that  it's  sprung  upon  the  audience 
that  he  is  an  impostor;  I  think  it  should  be  a 
big  effect..  A  'Mrs.  Vaughan'  has  arrived  to  see 
him — of  course  he's  on  the  stage  alone.  He  says 
that  her  intrusion  here  is  an  outrage — he  has 
given  her  a  house,  an  income,  a  carriage!  what 
more  does  she  want?  She  says  she  wants  their 
compact  fulfilled:  introductions,  society,  the 
chance  to  make  a  brilliant  match.  'What's  the 
use  of  a  house  where  nobody  comes?  I  bore 
myself  to  death  in  it!'  She  is  an  adventuress 
who  has  been — who  has  been  a  friend  of  the  real 
man's  in  New  Zealand,  and  expected  to  be  made 
his  wife.  When  he  died  in  delirium  tremens,  she 
suggested  to  the  protagonist  that  he  should  take 
advantage  of  his  likeness  to  Sir  Clement  Thurloe, 
and  her  possession  of  a  diary  and  letters,  to 
personate  him.  Then  there's  an  outburst  of 
'Clement's'  in  which  he  cries  that  he  wishes  to 


38  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

God  he'd  never  listened  to  her:  'I  was  ready 
enough  to  take  the  hand,  I  own  it  I  But  some- 
how— I  don't  know  how  it  is — now  I  come  to 
play  it  out,  it's  different.  When  a  fellow  calls 
himself  my  pal — when  a  good  woman's  standing 
by  my  side — I'd  give  all  I've  stolen  to  be  a 
beggar  and  a  gentleman  again  l'  " 

"Well?"  said  the  audience. 

"Well,  the  interview  is  interrupted  by  Lady 
Plynlimmon's  voice:  'Oh,  my  fan,  please;  I've 
forgotten  it!'  Rhoda  Vaughan  insists  on  her 
rights.  'Clement'  beseeches  her.  She  won't 
budge.  Lady  Plynlimmon  comes  down  the  stair- 
case, and  the  act  ends  with  the  man,  as  white  as 
death,  introducing  the  adventuress  into  the  home 
of  the  aristocrat  he  loves." 

"The  'villain'  is  the  hero?"  said  Miss  King. 

"He  isn't  depicted  as  a  hero.  The  world's 
been  against  him,  and  he  sinned  when  he  was 
worn  out  with  struggling.  He  felt  that  he  owed 
Society  nothing — that's  the  idea.  Then  he  meets 
Maud!" 

"You  give  away  the  element  of  surprise  in 
your  title ;  still  it's  good.  I  don't  see  any  actor- 
manager  playing  'Clement,'  though.  What  is 
the  reason  that  the  modern  hero  is  supposed  to 
lose  the  sympathy  of  the  audience  if  he  isn't  im- 
mutably noble,  while  the  modern  heroine  may 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  39 

violate  the  Decalogue?  I'm  sorry  'Clement'  is  a 
thief.  Of  course,  he's  only  robbing  the  'Crown'? 
The  Crown  can  afford  the  loss,  I  suppose — it 
won't  keep  the  Crown  awake  at  night.  Still,  a 
thief  is  low." 

"But  a  rogue  is  human.  I  don't  defend  him; 
I'm  not  his  advocate.  I  show  his  sin  and  his 
suffering.  He  is  essentially  weak — the  girl  he 
loves  is  to  be  won  for  the  asking " 

"You  don't  mean  to  say  he  actually  marries 
Maud?" 

"Ah,  but  the  temptation !"  exclaimed  Oliphant. 
"You  shall  hear." 

He  told  her  the  rest  when  they  drew  to  the 
hearth;  drifted  from  debate  to  reminiscence — 
recounting,  with  the  eager  egotism  that  is  bred 
of  loneliness,  something  of  his  boyhood,  and  re- 
ceiving impressions  of  her  own  life — suggestive, 
feminine — in  return.  He  felt  that  she  was  turn- 
ing the  pages  of  his  history  across  his  shoulder; 
and,  though  he  had  jestingly  declared  her  posi- 
tion here  to  be  ordinary,  it  constantly  surprised 
him  when  he  reflected  that  only  a  few  hours 
before  they  were  both  companionless,  and  had 
never  spoken  to  each  other.  The  room,  which 
had  always  appeared  to  him  depressing,  had  this 
evening  an  air  of  gaiety  and  of  home.  Even 
when  they  were  silent,  he  found  it  fortifying  to 


40  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

look  at  her;  and  even  when  he  did  not  look  at 
her,  it  was  delightful  to  know  that  she  was  there. 
At  ten  o'clock  she  rose  and  said  good-night ;  but 
the  magic  lingered  with  him  after  she  had  gone. 
The  atmosphere  was  for  once  exhilarating,  and 
the  throb  of  the  unexpected  was  in  it  still. 


CHAPTER  III 

A  rehearsal  of  the  drama  in  which  Oliphant 
was  to  commence  his  siege  of  London  had  been 
called  for  eleven  o'clock  the  following  day.  He 
saw  Miss  King  for  a  few  minutes  only  before  he 
left  the  house,  but  received  her  permission  to  try 
to  recover  her  belongings  for  her.  This  was  a 
task  which  the  threat  of  legal  proceedings,  and  a 
written  acknowledgment  of  the  debt,  assisted  him 
to  accomplish  without  much  difficulty.  He  con- 
veyed the  trunk  to  Burton  Crescent  by  means  of 
a  hansom,  and  then  walked  through  the  muddy 
streets  to  the  Queen's  Theatre. 

The  Queen's  had  recently  been  obtained  by 
an  actor  who  was  assuming  the  management  of 
a  theatre  for  the  first  time.  He  had  been  a 
leading  man  for  about  fifteen  years  now,  but  the 
manager  of  only  a  few  tours.  For  this  produc- 
tion, in  which  the  hero's  part  was  exceedingly 
strong,  he  had  selected  the  company  with  the 
utmost  care  and,  excepting  perhaps  the  Villain, 

41 


42  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

there  wasn't  a  member  of  it  in  whom  he  had  a 
rival  to  fear. 

The  stage  was  dark  and  draughty.  When 
Oliphant  reached  it  nobody  had  come  but  the 
prompter,  who  stood  by  a  small  table,  over- 
looking the  empty  orchestra  and  the  auditorium 
swathed  in  holland.  His  hands  were  plunged  in 
the  pockets  of  his  overcoat,  and  he  shivered.  He 
paid  small  attention  to  the  other's  advent,  be- 
cause he  was  to  be  described  on  the  playbills  as 
"Assistant  Stage-manager,"  and  Oliphant  was 
playing  a  small  part.  In  the  position  that  he 
had  filled  on  tour,  Oliphant  would  have  joined 
him  at  the  table;  in  the  position  that  he  filled 
here,  theatrical  etiquette  forbade  it.  He  walked 
up  and  down  in  the  wings,  and  questioned  for 
the  hundredth  time  if,  with  such  a  part  as  this, 
Edmund  Kean  himself  could  have  created  an 
effect. 

The  other  subordinates  commenced  to  as- 
semble, and  to  hang  about  with  him.  They 
watched  the  principals  arrive  and  stroll  to  the 
table  unabashed;  and  tried  to  hear  what  they 
talked  about,  and  envied  them  their  lustrous 
boots,  which  showed  that  they  had  come  in  cabs. 
The  Villain  recounted  a  funny  incident  to  the 
leading  lady,  and  she  laughed  merrily  without 
having  grasped  the  joke:  his  salary  was  under- 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  43 

stood  to  be  thirty  pounds  a  week,  arid  she  was 
only  beginning.  Besides,  the  celebrated  actor 
under  whom  she  had  studied,  and  who  had 
obtained  the  engagement  for  her,  had  always 
declared  that  her  laugh  was  her  strong  point. 
The  low  comedian  demanded  of  the  prompter 
when  they  were  "going  to  have  the  floats."  There 
was  considerable  delay  about  this,  and  general 
expectancy;  and  then  the  footlights  ameliorated 
the  gloom  a  little,  and  the  leading  lady,  who  was 
very  charming,  bent  over  the  blaze  of  light  in  a 
pretty  attitude  to  warm  her  hands.  The  "small 
part  women"  in  the  wings  looked  additionally 
miserable,  as  they  gazed  at  her,  and  the  men 
inquired  irritably  among  themselves  "why  the 
devil  they  were  called  for  eleven."  Only  one,  a 
youth  who  had  twenty  words  to  deliver,  affected 
to  be  oblivious  of  his  surroundings.  He  saun- 
tered to  and  fro,  muttering  and  gesticulating, 
stimulated  by  the  secret  thought  that  somebody 
of  importance  might  comment  on  his  enthusiasm. 
A  little  man,  with  a  hopeless  expression,  crept 
down  to  the  footlights,  and  was  greeted  with 
cordiality — especially  by  the  young  leading  lady. 
He  was  the  author.  He  had  a  roll  of  manuscript 
in  his  hand,  which  represented  the  alterations  he 
had  been  urged  to  make  at  the  last  rehearsal. 


44)  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

He  was  wondering  what  further  misfortunes 
would  befall  him  and  his  drama  to-day. 

Signs  of  impatience  might  be  detected  on  the 
faces  of  the  principals  also  now;  but  the  actor 
who  had  a  theatre  for  the  first  time  felt  it  due  to 
himself  to  keep  the  company  waiting.  He  strode 
through  the  wings  presently,  ignoring  the  minor 
members — who  scattered  to  let  him  pass — and, 
reaching  the  prompt-table,  raised  his  hat  about 
half  an  inch. 

"  'Morning,  ladies  and  gentlemen,"  he  said 
curtly  to  the  group  about  him.  He  made  some 
remark  to  the  author  about  the  weather,  and 
turned  to  the  assistant  stage-manager,  whom  he 
addressed  as  "Mr.  Mote."  He  was  fat,  and  held 
himself  stiffly  erect,  endeavouring  to  palliate  by 
his  carriage  the  loss  of  his  figure.  In  manner  he 
was  arrogant,  and  he  had  frequently  the  air  of 
swelling — as  often  as  he  wished  to  assert  his 
dignity  in  private,  or  to  express  emotion  in  a 
part. 

"Clear  the  stage,  please!"  cried  Mr.  Mote, 
clapping  his  hands  twice.  "Act  two,  scene  one! 
Sentry!  Come  on,  Mr. — er — Williams,  please — 
Act  two,  scene  one !" 

The  youth  who  had  been  immersed  in  study 
hurried  nervously  to  that  part  of  the  stage  where 
he  fancied  he  was  supposed  to  be  pacing  battle- 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  45 

merits  bathed  in  moonlight;  but  he  was  not  cer- 
tain that  he  wasn't  meant  to  be  in  a  corridor, 
looking  out  of  a  window.  This  lent  indecision 
to  his  movements.    He  said : 

"  'It's  a  fine  night.    How  quiet  it  is  I'  " 

At  the  same  moment  concealed  carpenters 
began  to  hammer  furiously.  The  youth  looked 
disconcerted,  but  nobody  else  took  any  notice. 

''How  quiet  it  is!'"  repeated  the  assistant 
stage-manager.  "Enter  the  Colonel.  'Colonel/ 
please !    Mr. — er — Fowler ! — 'How  quiet  it  is'  1" 

"I  beg  your  pardon!"  The  "Colonel"  rushed 
forward.  The  rehearsal  proceeded,  and  some  of 
the  women  in  the  wings  found  chairs,  and  chatted 
in  undertones. 

The  leading  lady  begged  the  Villain  to  advise 
her  how  she  should  "do  her  faint"  when  her  lover 
was  sentenced  to  be  shot;  and  they  moved  to- 
gether to  where  there  was  space  for  him  to 
demonstrate  his  conception  of  a  young  girl's 
behaviour  at  this  crisis.  She  confessed  the  fear 
that  she  would  "find  that  flight  of  steps  perfectly 
dreadful !"  and  he  assured  her  cynically  that  there 
were  "not  many  actresses  who  would  object  to 
be  given  a  flight  of  steps  to  faint  on."  As  to  her 
train — well,  it  was  difficult  to  show  her!  But 
there  was  a  way — if  she  half -turned,  and  bent 
00,  as  she  collapsed,  it  would  "fall  down  stage, 


46  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

and  the  picture  would  be  excellent."  The  Ad- 
venturess discussed  her  baby's  first  tooth,  and 
the  danger  of  convulsions,  with  the  low  comedian, 
who,  as  a  family  man,  spoke  authoritatively ;  and 
by  the  side  of  the  author,  who  sucked  his  umbrella 
handle,  the  Hero  sat,  shouting  comments,  and 
rising  from  time  to  time  to  bluster  with  more 
violence. 

The  humble  aspirants  who  incurred  his  dis- 
pleasure stammered  and  turned  pink;  and  one 
girl,  whose  arm  he  grasped  so  hard  that  he  hurt 
her,  in  indicating  the  "business"  that  he  desired, 
burst  into  tears.  Those  whose  ordeal  was  longest 
were  two  old  men.  They  had  been  in  the  theatres 
all  their  lives,  but  had  sunk,  from  the  small  posi- 
tions that  they  had  once  attained;  to-day  they 
were  scarcely  above  the  grade  of  supernumer- 
aries. The  younger  might  have  been  nearly 
sixty,  but  he  remained  burly  and  rubicund;  the 
other,  though  probably  not  much  older,  appeared 
to  be  his  senior  by  fully  a  decade.  In  his  tightly 
buttoned  frock-coat,  painfully  thin  and  shabby, 
he  was  the  neatest  and  most  pathetic  little  figure 
to  be  conceived,  as  he  struggled  to  avoid  the  fiery 
impatience  of  the  Hero's  rebukes.  The  beautiful 
old  face  grew  troubled  by  his  eagerness  to  under- 
stand what  was  required  of  him ;  and  occasionally, 
as  the  actor  stamped  and  bellowed,  he  glanced  at 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  47 

the  spectators,  as  if  fearing  that  his  humiliation 
must  excite  their  ridicule. 

He  escaped  into  the  wings  at  last,  and  leaning 
against  the  wall  of  the  scene-dock,  consumed  a 
sandwich,  which  served  him  for  his  dinner,  out 
of  a  piece  of  newspaper. 

Some  hitch  occurred;  lines  not  allotted  yet  had 
to  be  spoken  at  this  juncture. 

"What  are  we  waiting  for?"  demanded  the 
Hero.    "Get  on,  Mr.  Mote,  please." 

Mr.  Mote  explained  meekly  that  the  part  of 
the  "Lieutenant"  was  not  cast;  and  there  was 
a  few  moments'  consultation  as  to  which  of  the 
actors  had  better  "double"  it.  The  Hero's  gaze 
fell  on  Oliphant. 

"Here,  you!"  he  said,  beckoning;  "you  can 
double  this." 

Oliphant  took  the  type-written  half-sheet 
among  envious  glances  from  the  other  "small- 
part  men" ;  and  glancing  at  the  indication  at  the 
top,  crossed  the  stage,  and  began  to  read. 

He  was  surprised  to  find  that,  few  as  the  lines 
were,  they  gave  the  player  scope  to  distinguish 
himself.  He  was  supposed  to  stagger  on 
wounded,  with  a  tale  of  distant  disaster,  and 
appeal  to  the  "Colonel"  to  despatch  aid  to  his 
comrades.  The  performance  might  have  no  more 
than  the  clap -trap  effect  of  the  sudden  entrance 


48  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

and  the  reel  down  the  raking-piece ;  or  it  might 
be  one  that  would  rivet  the  attention  of  every 
critic  in  the  house.  He  saw  it  more  fully  with 
every  word  he  delivered :  the  chance  at  that  point 
for  a  break  in  the  voice ;  the  effort  to  be  strenuous, 
and  the  exhaustion  that  forbade  it;  the  horror 
in  the  man's  eyes  as  he  described — and  saw  again 
— the  scene  from  which  he  had  come!  A  genius 
with  an  opportunity  like  this  could  have  made 
the  success  of  the  evening.  He  read  well  at  sight 
customarily;  in  his  gratification  he  read  better 
than  usual ;  and  the  author,  who  had  fallen  in  love 
with  the  lines  as  he  wrote  them,  ceased  to  suck 
the  handle  of  his  umbrella,  and  reflected  with  a 
pleasant  smile  that  there  were  "damn  few  men 
in  London  who  could  equal  his  dialogue !" 

The  brief  speech  came  to  an  end ;  the  "Lieuten- 
ant" swooned;  and  Mr.  Mote  called  "Captain 
Harwood!" 

"Where's  'Captain  Harwood'?"  he  said,  look- 
ing round. 

"Z  play  'Captain  Harwood,'  "  said  Oliphant 
blankly. 

The  hitch  was  repeated — there  was  renewed 
consideration.  It  was  impossible  that  Oliphant 
could  play  the  "Lieutenant"  if  he  played 
"Captain  Harwood,"  for  both  characters  had  to 
be  on  the  stage  at  the  same  time. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  49 

"Well,  somebody  else  must  double  the  'Lieu- 
tenant,' "  said  the  Hero.  "Mr. — er — Mortimer's 
not  on  in  this  scene;  he  can  do  it." 

Oliphant  looked  at  him  in  dismay. 

"Would  you  mind  letting  somebody  else  play 
'Captain  Harwood'  and  my  keeping  the  'Lieu- 
tenant'?" he  asked.  "I  like  it  much  the  better  of 
the  two." 

The  Hero  made  a  rather  lengthy  pause.  It 
was  intended  to  indicate  amazement  at  the  impu- 
dence of  questioning  his  decision. 

"We  won't  discuss  which  of  the  two  you  like 
best,  if  you  please,"  he  said  imperiously.  "Mr. 
Mortimer!  Come  here!  .  .  .  You'll  study  the 
part  of  the  'Lieutenant'  by  to-morrow;  Mr.  Mote 
will  give  it  you.  .  .  .  Goon,  Mr. — er — Oliphant; 
take  up  your  cue,  please — Enter  'Captain  Har- 
wood'!" 

The  rehearsal  was  resumed,  and  Oliphant  went 
through  his  daily  task  like  an  automaton.  That 
flash  of  hope  was  already  extinguished.  He 
hadn't  realised  how  great  his  delight  had  been 
at  the  prospect  opened  to  him  until  the  speedy 
disappointment  revealed  it.  His  heart  felt  like 
lead  within  him,  and  he  was  glad  when  he  was 
free  to  efface  himself,  and  lament  and  smoke 
in  comparative  privacy  at  the  stage-door.     But 


50  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

he  had  to  go  back,  to  speak  a  single  line  in 
another  act. 

The  author  observed  his  return,  and  went  over 
to  him;  he  regretted  the  Hero's  high-handed 
arrangement,  for  the  sake  of  the  young  man,  and 
chiefly  for  the  sake  of  the  piece.  Mr.  Mortimer's 
performance  in  the  new  part  would  not  be  start- 
ling, to  judge  by  the  stolidity  he  displayed  in  the 
one  he  was  rehearsing  already. 

"It  was  a  pity  you  didn't  keep  the  'Lieuten- 
ant,' Mr.  Oliphant,  I  think,"  he  remarked;  "you 
read  it  very  well." 

Oliphant  knew  the  glow  that  comes  to  every 
young  actor  when  one  in  authority  praises  him. 
And  it  was  the  first  time  he  had  been  addressed 
by  the  author. 

"You  may  imagine  Z'm  sorry;  but  you  saw 
what  happened,  Mr.  Campbell,"  he  said,  shrug- 
ging his  shoulders. 

"Yes;  but  it's  a  pity;  you  were  very  good 
indeed.  I'll  speak  about  it  afterwards  and  see 
what  can  be  done." 

The  Hero  had  just  been  murmuring  noble 
sentiments,  which  would  eventually  be  delivered 
fortissimo,  and  as  he  made  his  exit,  the  sight  of 
Oliphant  and  the  dramatist  together  met  his  eye. 
He  stalked  across  to  them,  with  a  swollen  chest 
and  distended  nostrils. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  51 

"What  do  you  mean,"  he  exclaimed,  "by  ap- 
pealing to  Mr.  Campbell  against  me?  How  dare 
you?" 

"No,  no,"  said  the  author,  "he  didn't.  It  was 
I  who  spoke  to  Mr.  Oliphant." 

"7  am  manager  in  this  theatre,"  continued  the 
actor  passionately,  disregarding  the  explanation. 
"Be  good  enough  to  understand  that,  Mr.  Oli- 
phant, once  and  for  all!  If  you're  not  satisfied 
with  the  part  you're  playing,  you're  not  obliged 
to  play  anything,  you  can  resign  your  engage- 
ment. I  have  said  you  play  'Captain  Harwood,' 
and  that's  the  end  of  it.  No,  Campbell,  my  boy! 
No,  no,  my  boy !  I  can't  allow  that  sort  of  thing 
—I  can't!" 

There  was  a  second  in  which  Oliphant  was 
tempted  fiercely  to  answer  that  he  did  resign  his 
engagement,  but  the  knowledge  of  the  straits 
that  the  indulgence  would  entail  held  him  dumb. 
Though  he  had  been  in  the  theatrical  profession 
seven  years,  this  was  his  first  experience  of  a 
managerial  bully  like  the  Hero,  and  he  was  sick 
with  shame  and  rage. 

His  line  in  the  ensuing  act  was  no  sooner 
uttered  than  he  left  the  building.  He  had  quite 
forgotten  Alma  King;  his  consciousness  at  the 
moment  was  only  of  the  part  that  had  been  torn 
from  him,  and  of  the  insult  that  he  had  been 


52  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

compelled  to  swallow.  It  was  when  five  minutes 
had  passed  that  the  remembrance  that  he  would 
find  her  in  the  lodging  recurred  to  him;  and 
fortified  a  trifle  by  the  recollection  he  hastened 
homeward. 

She  was  at  the  table  in  the  drawing-room, 
writing  letters — applications  for  engagement.  A 
copy  of  The  Stage  lay  near  the  cheap  stationery 
and  the  penny  bottle  of  ink. 

"Am  I  in  the  way?"  he  said. 

"Why  should  you  be  in  the  way?  It's  I  who 
ought  to  ask  that.    Well?" 

"Well,  it  isn't  well!  I'm  angry,  furious,  in 
the  blues!"  He  burst  out  with  the  tale  of  what 
had  happened,  and  the  sympathy  in  her  face  was 
sweet  to  him  as  he  reached  the  point.  "If  only 
I  could  have  afforded  to  answer  the  cad!"  he 
exclaimed;  "I  think  I'm  ashamed  of  myself  that 
I  didn't!" 

"It's  at  times  like  this  that  poverty  scalds," 
she  said.  "I  know  your  feeling — I've  had  it  so 
often.  But  you  were  perfectly,  perfectly  right 
not  to  throw  your  part  up — it  would  have  been 
insane !  You  might  have  had  to  wait  months  for 
another  chance  in  town." 

"I  suppose  you're  right,"  said  Oliphant,  "that 
I  was  right.    But  all  the  same,  it's  just  one  of 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  53 

those  instances  of  his  wisdom  that  a  man  isn't 
proud  to  recall." 

"You're  inclined  to  be  morbid,  aren't  you?" 
said  Miss  King  thoughtfully.  "In  the  way  you 
look  at  things  generally?    Just  a  little!" 

He  flushed.  "I've  never  been  told  so  before. 
It's — well,  I've  been  a  good  deal  alone;  perhaps 
it's  due  to  that,  if  I  am." 

"I  think  you  are.  .  .  .  You  look  as  if  I  had 
accused  you  of  a  crime." 

"You  took  me  aback,  rather.  It  sounds  weak, 
too.    Do  you  think  I'm  weak?" 

"I  should  say  you  are — emotional.  .  .  .  Well, 
'weak'  as  well  then,  yes! — in  some  ways.  ...  I 
don't  think  you  will  be  spoilt  by  success  if  you 
get  it.    That's  the  greatest  test  of  character." 

"Poverty  is  supposed  to  be  the  greatest  test," 
he  said. 

"Yes.  But  I  don't  believe  it  is.  Poverty 
hardens  a  character  by  degrees,  but  success  lays 
it  bare  in  a  flash.  You  would  be  very  nice  to 
the  small  people,  if  you  were  a  manager,  I'm 
sure.  If  you  were  the  manager,  for  example,  I 
should  receive  an  answer  to  this"  She  pointed 
to  one  of  the  letters  beside  her. 

"What  is  it  for?"  asked  Oliphant;  "is  it  any- 
thing worth  having?" 


54  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"It  is  an  appeal  for  a  second-rate  part  in  a 
fifth-rate  company.  If  I  am  fortunate,  I  shall 
play  in  a  different  town  every  other  night,  and 
search  for  a  new  lodging  every  other  day.  The 
advertisement  concludes :  'People  who  can't  keep 
sober,  save  stamps!'  " 

"Good  heavens!"  cried  the  man;  "you  don't 
mean  to  say  you  apply  for  those  things?  They're 
not  addressed  to  you.  Have  you  ever  travelled 
in  a  Portable?" 

"No;  I  can  imagine  what  it  is  like,  though, 
fully." 

"But  they  don't  want  an  artist,  Miss  King; 
they  don't  want  an  actress!  Do  you  know  what 
the  audience  that  you  would  play  to  is  like?  Do 
you  know  what  the  salary  is  like?  Have  you 
any  idea  what  the  company  is  like  that  you'd 
be  with?  You  wouldn't  be  able  to  endure  the 
engagement  for  a  fortnight  if  you  got  it." 

The  girl's  gesture  had  dignity  as  well  as  weari- 
ness. 

"You  seem  to  forget,"  she  said  quietly;  "I 
am  not  in  a  position  to  consider  these  drawbacks. 
I'm  here  on  your  introduction — with  only  a  few 
shillings  in  the  world;  and  I  owe  money  at  the 
house  I  have  left.  I'm  not  afraid  your  landlady 
would  turn  me  out  in  a  week's  time — or  even  in 
a  month's:  she  trusts  me — and  you!    But  what 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  55 

kind  of  woman  should  I  be  if  I  took  advantage 
of  your  introduction  and  her  confidence?" 

"I  don't  suggest  you  should  take  any  advan- 
tage at  all.  There's  such  a  thing  as  being  too 
conscientious.  It  would  be  too  conscientious  if 
you  hampered  your  career  rather  than  accept  a 
few  weeks'  credit,  or  a  friend's  help.  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  it  makes  no  difference  to  Mrs.  Tubbs 
whether  she  gets  her  rent  every  Monday  or  every 
month ;  she  doesn't  depend  on  letting  lodgings — 
if  she  did,  she'd  be  in  the  workhouse!  She  has 
some  share  in  a  business  that  her  brother  has; 
he's  an  upholsterer  in  Mabledon  Place." 

"I  shan't  take  such  an  engagement  if  I  can 
get  an  ordinary  one  quickly,  you  may  be  sure," 
she  said;  "it  will  have  to  be  my  sole  resource. 
But  I  know  the  meaning  of  'duty' ! — it's  my  duty 
to  sacrifice  my  interests  and  pay.  I've  never 
done  anything  I  knew  to  be  wrong  in  my  life. 
Oh,  I  don't  forget  I  let  a  stranger  speak  to  me 
yesterday — and  I  can't  complain  if  you  think  it 
wasn't  the  first  time ! — and  I  asked  him  in  to  my 
room;  and  it  was  a  mistake  that  I  shall  regret 
to  the  day  I  die.  But  it  wasn't  wrong.  And  you 
know  it  wasn't  'wrong';  and  God  knows  there 
was  no  more  of  'wrong'  in  my  heart  when  I 
opened  that  door  to  you  than  if  we  had  both  been 
children.     I  regret  it — I  always  shall — but  I'm 


56  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

not  ashamed  of  it ;  if  I  were  ashamed,  I'm  afraid 
my  goodness  would  go  altogether,  and  I  couldn't 
live!  I'm  not  going  to  despise  myself  now  and 
be  a  coward,  and  contemptible,  rather  than 
'hamper  my  career,'  as  you  put  it." 

"I  won't  urge  you  to  do  anything  you're 
opposed  to,"  responded  Oliphant  slowly,  after  a 
moment  had  passed.  "But  you've  said  one  thing 
I  want  to  answer ;  it  meant  you  couldn't  complain 
if — if  I  were  ignorant  enough  to  think  lightly  of 
you.  I  should  like  you  to  hear  me  say  that  I 
respect  you  more  than  any  woman  I've  ever 
met." 

The  subject  of  her  endeavours  was  not  re- 
sumed till  the  morrow,  when  he  was  leaving  for 
the  Queen's.  Then  she  announced  an  intention 
of  calling  again  on  all  the  dramatic  agents  who 
had  her  name  on  their  books ;  and  he  walked  some 
part  of  the  way  to  the  Strand  beside  her. 

The  thought  of  what  doubtless  awaited  her 
in  these  offices,  towards  which  scores  of  other 
women,  equally  avid  of  employment,  were  hurry- 
ing from  all  quarters  of  London  at  the  same 
time,  forbade  boldness  to  them  both,  and  Oli- 
phant parted  from  her  with  small  expectation 
of  hearing  good  news  when  they  met  at  tea. 

His  haste  to  escape  from  the  theatre  the  pre- 
vious afternoon  had  left  him  uncertain  at  what 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  57 

hour  the  rehearsal  would  commence  this  morning, 
but  glancing  at  the  call-board  as  he  entered  the 
passage,  he  found  that  he  had  guessed  correctly. 
The  Hero,  however,  was  already  on  the  stage, 
and  it  was  immediately  evident  that  his  resent- 
ment was  not  forgotten.  He  stalked  across  to 
the  young  man  without  delay,  his  chest  and 
nostrils  expanded  to  their  fullest  capacity. 

"Oh — er — I  shan't  want  you  for  the  piece  at 
all,  Mr.  Oliphant,"  he  said  haughtily.  "Give 
your  part  back  to  Mr.  Mote,  please !  You — er — 
aren't  tall  enough." 


CHAPTER  IV 

There  was  no  written  agreement;  Oliphant 
had  been  engaged,  as  hundreds  of  actors  and 
actresses  are  engaged  every  year,  by  word  of 
mouth.  Even  if  it  had  been  otherwise,  he  could 
not  have  afforded  to  test  the  legality  of  the 
reprisal.  He  was  dismissed — because  the  author 
had  condoled  with  him  on  the  Hero's  auto- 
cracy. "Nothing  happens  but  the  unforeseen": 
the  actor  had  left  the  lodging  to  attend  a  re- 
hearsal, expecting  to  draw  two  pounds  a  week 
during  the  run  of  the  play;  the  actress  had  left 
it,  despondent,  to  make  the  round  of  the  agents. 
The  man  returned  without  a  prospect;  and  the 
girl  came  back  with  an  "offer." 

She  was  offered  an  engagement  to  go  to  South 
Africa.  The  manager,  who  had  come  to  London 
for  the  purpose  of  organising  a  company,  had 
been  in  the  second  office  that  she  entered — had 
noticed  her,  asked  the  agent  her  name,  and 
concluded  the  arrangement  on  the  spot.  At 
rehearsals  she  would  have  to  prove  herself  com- 

58 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  59 

petent;  but  on  this  point  she  had  no  misgivings, 
and  she  was  overjoyed. 

"It  was  the  purest  chancel"  she  cried.  "He 
has  been  here  a  fortnight,  and  Ash  has  never 
mentioned  him  to  me — or  me  to  him.  If  I  had 
been  five  minutes  later,  he'd  have  gone,  and  I 
shouldn't  even  have  known  I  had  missed  an 
opportunity.  But,  of  course,  I  shall  have  to 
pay  Ash  his  commission  just  the  same — it  was 
in  his  office."  She  paused  inquiringly.  "Is  any- 
thing the  matter?"  she  asked.  "Has  it  been  un- 
pleasant again  to-day?" 

Oliphant  told  her  briefly  what  had  occurred. 

What  could  she  say?  The  first  effect  of  sym- 
pathy is  to  weight  the  sympathiser's  tongue,  and 
the  second  is  to  render  her  self-conscious.  "I 
am  so  sorry,"  murmured  Miss  King — and  heard 
the  echo  of  the  vapid  answer  for  ten  seconds. 
"What  shall  you  do?"  she  continued. 

"I  must  look  for  something  else." 

"In  London?" 

"Oh  yes,  in  London;  at  all  events  in  London 
as  yet.  I  want  to  get  in,  I  want  to  get  in !  The 
stage-doors  are  stouter  than  the  starling's  bars. 
But  I've  been  hurling  myself  against  them  too 
long  to  turn  away  and  pretend  the  grapes  are 
sour  now.  They're  sweet,  Miss  King,  they're 
luscious,  and  my  mouth's  watering  for  them!" 


60  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"You  might  come  back  to  the  charge  all  the 
stronger  for  a  rest,"  she  suggested. 

"Yes,  and  all  the  older — don't  forget  that.  I 
left  the  provinces  swearing  that  I'd  get  a  hearing 
here.  I've  applied  everywhere.  I've  tramped 
the  streets,  and  worn  out  my  boots,  and  the 
sinews  of  war  are  reduced  to  shillings:  I'm  not 
going  to  feel  that  all  that  has  been  thrown  away 
while  I've  my  health  and  a  watch  and  chain. 
London  owes  me  for  the  energy  I've  expended. 
And  one  of  these  days  it's  going  to  pay  me  for 
it — with  compound  interest.  If  I  returned  to 
the  provinces  now,  I  should  feel  that  I  had  made 
a  bad  debt,  and  the  thought  that  I'd  made  a 
bad  debt  would  make  me  a  bad  actor,  and  if  I 
were  a  bad  actor,  I  should  have  no  excuse  for 
existing  in  this  overcrowded  world  at  all!     If 

I'm  not  an  actor,  I'm  nothing,  and This 

isn't  strength  of  character,  it's  hysteria,  to  be 
perfectly  truthful;  I  don't  suppose  I  could  get  a 
provincial  engagement  before  the  spring  if  I 
tried." 

"Haven't  you  any  friends?" 

"Haven't  I  any  friends?"  he  repeated  medita- 
tively. "Well,  I've  relations;  I  go  to  see  them 
occasionally — when  I've  a  new  suit  of  clothes. 
They  aren't  in  the  profession — nor  in  England, 
at  the  present  time — so  we  needn't  take  them 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  61 

into  account.  But,  yes,  I  have  a  friend — I've 
an  extraordinary  friend — I've  a  friend  who,  I 
honestly  believe,  would  lend  me  a  thousand 
pounds  if  I  asked  him  for  it." 

She  looked  to  see  if  he  was  serious.  "Is  this 
hysteria  too?" 

"No,  this  is  a  sober  fact.  I  was  at  Oxford 
with  him  and  we  were  very  chummy.  He  had 
leanings  towards  literature,  and  every  qualifica- 
tion for  embracing  it,  including  the  most  im- 
portant— it  didn't  matter  to  him  in  the  least  if 
he  never  made  it  pay.  He  was  worth  about  ten 
thousand  a  year  when  he  was  nine  years  old. 
We  haven't  met  very  often  lately,  but  I'm  bound 
to  admit  that  that's  entirely  my  fault.  When  I 
do  dine  with  him,  I  find  him  as  good  a  fellow  as 
ever  he  was.  I  should  be  very  fond  of  him  if  he 
hadn't  untold  wealth  like  the  prince  in  a  fairy 
tale;  I  struggled  with  the  ten  thousand  a  year, 
but  the  accumulations  of  his  minority  were  the 
last  straw." 

"You  don't  expect  me  to  believe  that,  of 
course?"  she  said. 

"Why  not — does  it  sound  petty?  Perhaps  I 
didn't  express  myself  very  well;  I  mean  we 
should  still  be  pals  if  he  weren't  so  rich.  Two 
men  whose  lives  are  antithetical  can't  be  very 
'pally,'  you  know.    A  very  rich  man  and  a  very 


68  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

poor  one  may  like  each  other  extremely — they 
may  find  each  other  very  estimable  and  interest- 
ing— but  they  can't  find  each  other  so  companion- 
able as  if  they  were  both  flush,  or  both  beggars. 
Otho  Fairbairn  keeps  racehorses,  and — and  is  a 
dear  good  fellow.  But  I  find  it  difficult  to  keep 
myself ;  and  though  we've  points  in  common,  I'm 
perfectly  aware  that  by  the  time  we've  finished  a 
cigar  each,  he  begins  to  feel  the  evening  would 
be  livelier  if  he'd  asked  a  'chappie'  who  was  going 
down  to  Kempton,  too,  next  day.  Abstractions 
pall.  I  can  talk  to  you  much  more  freely  than 
I  can  to  Fairbairn,  though  I've  known  him  for 
years.  .  .  .  Tell  me — you  go  to  the  Cape  with  a 
repertoire,  of  course.    What  are  the  pieces?" 

She  named  them — one  was  running  at  a  West 
End  house.  "I'm  to  go  to  see  it;  I  shall  write 
in  to-day.  If  you  like  I'll  ask  for  two  seats,  and 
we  might  go  together." 

"I'd  like  it  very  much;  I  was  thinking  of  writ- 
ing in  myself.    What  line  are  you  playing?" 

"Oh,  lead,"  she  said. 

"Really?" 

"Oh  yes,  I'm  engaged  for  lead;  and  the  parts 
are  excellent,  aren't  they?  It  will  be  splendid 
experience,  too,  with  a  repertoire.  It's  a  good 
thing  I  have  my  trunk;  but  even  as  it  is  .  .  . 
I  have  to  find  the  modern  wardrobe  myself,  you 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  63 

know !  Still  I  shall  be  all  right  for  the  first  fort- 
night, and  I  can  get  one  or  two  frocks  in  Cape 
Town." 

She  did  not  mention  what  her  salary  was  to  be, 
though;  and  in  view  of  the  circumstances,  and 
her  general  frankness,  the  peculiarity  of  the 
reservation  struck  Oliphant  as  forcibly  as  if  he 
were  again  a  novice.  He  remembered  living  with 
an  actor  years  before  and  listening  to  his  domestic 
anxieties  until  three  o'clock  in  the  morning,  and 
there  was  nothing  the  actor  hadn't  communicated 
when  the  tour  came  to  an  end  excepting  how 
much  a  week  he  received.  Past  salaries  were 
quoted;  and  there  were  confidences  about  his 
mother's  intemperance  and  the  shortcomings  of 
his  wife;  but  his  "terms"  of  to-day  were  tacitly 
understood  to  be  a  sacred  matter. 

With  this  single  exception — the  only  profes- 
sional trait  he  had  observed  in  her — Miss  King 
was  candour  personified.  The  tickets  for  the 
theatre  arrived,  "With  the  acting  manager's 
compliments,"  and  she  and  Oliphant  spent  an 
evening  in  the  dress-circle.  Both  enjoyed  it.  To 
be  able  to  lounge  in  a  velvet  fauteuil  in  evening 
dress,  when  he  can  ill  afford  the  sixpence  for  the 
programme,  is  the  one  advantage  that  the  actor 
out  of  work  possesses  over  the  rest  of  the  un- 
employed.   His  dinner  may  have  been  a  sausage, 


64  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

and  for  supper  nothing  may  await  him  at  all; 
but  a  draught  of  oblivion  is,  at  least,  permitted 
him  by  the  kindly  etiquette  of  "the  profession"; 
and  many  a  hopeless  heart  has  been  fortified 
by  it. 

Yet  it  is  tantalising,  sometimes  maddening. 
Sometimes  it  fills  the  breast  of  the  actor  out  of 
work  with  such  longings  that  he  wrings  his  hands 
with  desire — this  view,  from  the  Delectable 
Mountains,  of  the  Celestial  City  whose  gates  are 
closed.  Oliphant  enjoyed  the  performance — to 
watch  good  acting  gave  him  as  keen  a  delight  as 
a  musician  derives  from  a  superb  instrumentalist ; 
but  to  him  the  pleasure  of  the  evening  was  alloyed 
by  the  craving  that  assailed  him  in  the  entr'actes. 
To  Miss  King  there  was  no  alloy.  The  girl  fore- 
saw herself  in  the  part  of  the  favourite  actress 
whom  she  had  come  to  study  and  to  criticise ;  and 
it  was  almost  like  witnessing  her  own  success. 
She  sat  recalling  the  "business,"  debating 
whether  it  could  be  improved,  and  thrilling  with 
the  anticipation  of  delivering  certain  lines. 

The  epoch  of  the  drama  was  admirably 
adapted  to  her.  She  seemed  created  to  wear  the 
robes  of  a  bygone  age — almost  any  bygone  age — 
and  move  among  great  deeds.  She  would  have 
looked  lovely  as  Juliet,  which  she  wanted  to  play ; 
as  Hypatia,  which  she  hadn't  thought  of,  she 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  65 

would  have  been  ideal;  the  intense  earnestness 
of  the  part  was  there  in  her  face.  Oliphant  was 
again  conscious  of  this  when  they  left  the  theatre, 
and  turned  homeward  through  the  wet  streets. 
He  was  also  conscious  that  not  one  woman  in  a 
hundred,  trembling  with  thanksgiving,  would 
have  divined  his  mood  and  troubled  to  assuage 
it  by  the  first  remark  she  made : 

"I  daresay  you'll  be  playing  there  one  day!" 

"I?"  he  exclaimed. 

"I  daresay.  If  you  were  as  sure  of  your  future 
as  I  am,  you'd  be  happier." 

"But  why?" 

"How  shall  I  define?  You're  an  enthusiast — ■ 
there  aren't  so  many  of  them  in  our  profession! 
But  it  isn't  that  either — I  suppose  enthusiasts  fail 
too.  You  impress  me  with  the  idea  that  you'll 
succeed,  and  I've  never  had  the  conviction  about 
any  one  else.  If  I've  been  curious  about  people 
at  all,  it  has  been  to  wonder  why  on  earth  they 
ever  took  to  the  stage." 

"Because  it's  the  laziest  life." 

"Say  it  may  be;  don't  you  study?" 

"Oh,  1  do;  but  have  you  been  on  many  tours 
where  the  people  did?" 

"Of  course  one  can  take  it  easy,  if  one  likes, 
now  there  are  no  more  stock  companies.  It 
couldn't  have  been  very  'lazy'  in  the  old  days 


66  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

when  one  had  to  master  three  or  four  parts  a 
week.  Those  were  the  times  to  make  actresses — 
when  one  sat  up  all  night  studying  with  a  wet 
towel  round  one's  head!  when  one  was  Lady 
Macbeth  on  Monday,  and  Lady  Gay  Spanker  on 
Tuesday.  Ah,  heavenly  times!  Yes,  to  people 
who  don't  work  at  home  it  is  the  laziest  life  now, 
I  suppose — during  an  engagement ;  they're  fairly 
busy  when  they're  'resting.'  What  are  you  going 
to  try  for  to-morrow?" 

"I'm  going  to  try  to  see  Townsend,"  he  said. 
"You  know  they  are  producing  a  piece  of  his  at 
the  West  Central.  I  once  went  out  in  one  of  his 
things ;  and  he  rehearsed  the  company.  He  was 
kind  enough  to  think  me  good." 

"Will  he  remember  you?" 

"An  author  never  remembers  anything  except 
his  grudge  against  the  critic  who  gave  him  a  bad 
notice,  but  I  shall  remind  him  who  I  am.  I  hear 
they  have  only  engaged  the  principals  so  far,  and 
the  first  call  is  for  twelve  o'clock  to-inorrow.  I 
mean  to  waylay  him  as  he  goes  in." 

To  waylay  a  man  as  he  goes  in ;  to  scheme  for 
an  introduction  to  another  who  doesn't  want  to 
know  you;  to  submit  to  rudeness,  and  disguise 
privation  under  well-cut  clothes;  to  smile  in  the 
Strand  and  break  your  heart  in  private,  are  the 
essential  prenminaries  to  success  on  the  stage, 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  67 

unless  you  have  money,  or  your  father  was  a 
favourite  actor. 

Miss  King  was  rehearsing  in  a  large  room  over 
a  public-house  in  Covent  Garden,  and  after 
accompanying  her  there  next  day,  Oliphant 
proceeded  to  his  destination.  The  stage-door  of 
the  West  Central  was  in  a  narrow  court  not  more 
than  five  minutes  distant,  and  he  reached  it  too 
early.  Rather  than  incur  the  risk  of  missing  the 
dramatist,  though,  he  remained;  and  casting 
eager  glances  in  the  direction  in  which  the  man 
must  come,  endeavoured  to  persuade  himself  that 
he  was  hopeful.  To  be  hopeful  is  to  wear  a 
cheerful  expression,  and  a  cheerful  expression  is 
valuable  to  the  applicant  for  favours. 

When  Mr.  Townsend  appeared  he  was  walk- 
ing at  a  swift  pace.  He  passed  Oliphant  without 
any  sign  of  recognition,  and,  hastening  after  him, 
the  young  man  said  diffidently : 

"Mr.  Townsend  1" 

"Eh?    Yes;  what  is  it?" 

"You  don't  remember  me;  my  name's  Royce 
Oliphant;  I  played  'Albert  Kenyon'  in  Don 
Quixote  of  Belgravia — the  Number  1  Com- 
pany." 

"Oh  y-e-s,  yes.    How  d'ye  do,  Mr.  Oliphant?" 

"Is  there  any  part  open  in  this?  I  should  be 


68  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

immensely  glad  to  get  a  chance  at  the  West 
Central." 

"I'm  afraid  the  cast  is  complete.  You — er — 
might  drop  me  a  reminder  when  the  tour  starts. 
I'm  afraid  there's  nothing  open  in  the  produc- 
tion." 

"Not  a  small  part?  To  come  to  town  I'd  take 
twenty  lines." 

The  author  mused. 

"Well,  there's  a— I  don't  know;  I'll  see.  It's 
just  possible  that  I  can  offer  you  something.  You 
might  wait  a  second,  will  you?" 

He  plunged  into  the  gloomy  entrance,  and 
clattered  down  the  stairs.  And  a  quarter  of  an 
hour  went  by. 

When  he  emerged  he  was  with  the  stage- 
manager.  Oliphant's  momentary  expectation, 
however,  faded  into  blankness  as  he  saw  that  Mr. 
Townsend  had  forgotten  all  about  him.  He 
stopped  him  again : 

"Mr.  Townsend  I" 

"Eh?  Oh,  yes,  yes.  I  have  to  go  round  to 
the  front  with  Mr.  Bensusan  now.  I'll  see  you 
when  I  come  back.  Don't  go  away;  I  shan't  be 
ten  minutes." 

The  actor  made  a  cigarette,  and  stood  before 
the  door  like  a  sentinel.  An  hour  passed.  He 
would  have  liked  to  sit  down,  but  there  was  no- 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  69 

where  to  sit.  Two  hours  passed — two  hours  and 
a  half.  Still  Mr.  Townsend  did  not  return.  In 
desperation  at  last  Oliphant  went  in  search  of 
him.  At  the  box-office  it  was  believed  that  he 
would  be  found  at  lunch  in  the  restaurant  across 
the  road;  and  he  was  discovered  eating  oysters. 
He  looked  up  as  Oliphant  approached  him. 

"Oh — oh,  Mr.  Oliphant!  yes,  of  course!  I 
mentioned  the  matter  to  Mr.  Bensusan ;  but  there 
are  wheels  within  wheels,  you  know,  my  boy! — 
I  can't  work  it.    I'm  sorry." 

"It  can't  be  helped,"  said  Oliphant.  "Thanks 
for  doing  what  you  could." 

He  turned  away,  and  paused  among  the  tur- 
moil of  the  Strand,  considering  what  to  try  for 
next.  The  odour  of  the  restaurant  lurked  in  his 
nostrils  enticingly,  and  a  passing  omnibus  threw 
a  clot  of  mud  in  his  face. 


CHAPTER  V 

A  few  days  later  Miss  King  sailed  for  the 
Cape.  She  had  contrived  to  discharge  her  debt 
to  Mrs.  Tubbs — probably  by  the  sacrifice  of 
something  from  her  trunk :  Oliphant  did  not  hear 
how  the  payment  was  accomplished — and  the 
widow  deplored  her  departure  on  every  occasion 
that  she  appeared  with  the  remaining  lodger's 
tea  and  toast. 

Oliphant  missed  the  girl  too — more  than  he 
would  have  believed  was  possible  considering  how 
brief  a  time  she  had  lived  there.  He  felt  lonelier 
than  ever  now  when  he  returned  to  the  empty 
drawing-room  after  tramping  the  pavements  in 
vain.  It  is  one  of  the  painful  features  of  the 
theatrical  life  that  the  friends  of  to-day  are  so 
often  strangers  to-morrow;  every  tour  sees  inti- 
macies formed  among  people  who,  after  the  com- 
pany is  disbanded,  may  not  meet  one  another 
again  for  years.  But  Miss  King  had  been  met  in 
an  unusual  way,  and  in  this  case  his  own  environ- 
ment remained  the  same.  Its  sameness  empha- 
sised her  absence,  and  lent  a  pathos  to  it. 

70 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  71 

It  was  about  a  week  after  their  farewell  that 
something  unlooked  for  happened — something 
that  promised  to  alter  the  whole  complexion  of 
his  affairs.  A  letter  lay  on  his  hot-water  can 
one  morning,  and  a  letter  was  sufficiently  rare 
for  him  to  open  it  with  eagerness.  When  he  had 
read  it  his  eyes  sparkled,  and  the  attic  looked 
lovelier.  London  had  a  heart  after  all,  and  he 
could  hear  it  beating.  London  was  human !  The 
agent  with  whom  he  had  left  The  Impostor  wrote 
that  he  could  place  it  for  immediate  production 
at  a  West  End  house.  The  percentage  offered 
was  very  fair  in  view  of  the  author's  obscurity; 
and  a  hundred  pounds,  on  account  of  fees,  would 
be  paid  when  the  contract  was  signed.  Oliphant 
was  asked  to  reply  at  once,  stating  whether  he 
was  prepared  to  accept  the  terms.  He  stood 
still  and  laughed. 

Yes,  he  was  "prepared"!  His  hands  shook  as 
he  dressed.  He  would  reply  in  person.  That 
the  drama  had  been  accepted  three  times  already 
and  that  three  contracts  for  it  had  been  broken, 
did  not  damp  his  exhilaration,  for  the  offer  of 
money  on  account  showed  that  business  was 
meant,  and  besides,  the  production  was  to  be 
"immediate."  For  once  he  left  Burton  Crescent 
buoyantly.  Like  the  attic,  the  familiar  windows 
of  Marchmont  Street  had  an  unfamiliar  air.  The 


72  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

confectioner's  which  had  recently  appeared  to 
mock  him  with  its  display  of  unattainable  short- 
bread decorated  with  New  Year's  greetings  in 
citron  and  sugar-plums — the  little  toy-shop, 
lower  down,  where  he  bought  his  papers — the 
oranges  and  tomatoes,  and  apples  and  chestnuts, 
on  a  stall  under  the  tarpaulin — everything  smiled 
to  him  to-day;  he  contemplated  the  landmarks 
with  affection.  Even  the  Strand — though  he 
could  never  love  the  Strand — he  was  able,  at 
least,  to  forgive.  He  remembered  the  sufferings 
it  had  inflicted  without  resentment.  He  had  got 
the  better  of  the  Strand  at  last! 

What  a  good  fellow  was  the  agent !  though  he 
had  never  struck  him  in  that  light  before.  How 
difficult,  as  the  brilliant  details  were  imparted, 
to  disguise  that  the  thing  appeared  incredible, 
something  too  marvellous  to  be  true.  "Clement" 
was  to  be  played  by  Herbert  Rayne,  who  hoped 
to  obtain  a  lease  of  the  Dominion.  Herbert 
Rayne  would  be  excellent  as  "Clement."  And 
he  had  a  reputation — the  part  of  the  hero  was 
in  first-rate  hands.  Would  Oliphant  meet  him 
here  on  the  morrow  at,  say,  one  o'clock?  Yes, 
he  would  not  fail;  it  was  an  appointment.  His 
blood  bubbled  in  his  veins  as  he  proposed  a  drink. 
There  was  a  flicker  of  feeble  sunlight  on  the 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  73 

puddles  when  they  stood  outside,  and  he  saw  a 
blaze  that  dazzled  him. 

How  charming  was  Herbert  Rayne  when  the 
interview  took  place  and  signatures  were  written! 
How  novel  it  was  to  be  deferred  to  by  a  popular 
actor,  with  astrakhan  on  his  overcoat,  and  to 
discuss  with  him  the  qualifications  of  other  popu- 
lar actors!  What  did  the  author  think  of  Miss 
Proctor  for  "Lady  Maud"?  The  author,  aston- 
ished at  his  boldness,  confessed  that  he  had 
always  thought  Miss  Proctor  lacked  sympathy. 
Rayne  agreed  with  him — she  did.  And  she  asked 
thirty  pounds  a  week,  which  was  absurd.  He 
suggested  somebody  else,  and  they  walked  down 
the  Strand  together  arm  in  arm.  And  they  were 
seen  by  two  persons  to  whom  Oliphant  was 
known!  He  was  mortal  and  the  fact  gratified 
him. 

"You're  an  actor  yourself,  Mr.  Oliphant,  eh?" 
said  Rayne.    "How  about  playing  in  the  piece?" 

"I  don't  think  so,  thanks,"  laughed  the  young 
man;  "I  shall  be  nervous  enough  as  it  is!" 

"It  would  be  good  business  for  you — author's 
fees  and  a  salary  too!  But,  of  course,  you're 
right ;  it'd  be  a  mistake.  I  think  I  shall  be  able 
to  get  the  Dominion — I  shall  know  this  week. 
I've  made  them  a  fair  offer.  The  rent  they  ask 
is  a  hundred  and  fifty,  but  that's  all  pickles!" 


74  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

No  longer  compelled  to  husband  the  few 
sovereigns  that  remained  from  the  loan  on  his 
watch  and  chain,  Oliphant  proposed  luncheon, 
and  Rayne  did  not  decline  the  invitation.  On 
the  contrary,  he  declared  there  was  only  one  place 
to  lunch  at,  and  that  was  Dolibo's. 

"It's  the  best  cooking  in  London,  I  say;  and 
then  it  saves  time — as  everybody  goes  there,  one 
meets  all  the  people  one  has  to  see.  I  must  intro- 
duce you  to  Ravioli." 

So  they  jumped  into  a  hansom,  and  drove  to 
Dolibo's;  and  Oliphant  was  duly  introduced  to 
ravioli,  which  he  had  presumed  was  a  composer, 
but  which  turned  out  to  be  a  mess  that  tasted  of 
nothing  but  the  tomatoes.  Nevertheless  it  was 
a  delightful  day.  And  the  fact  that  the  agent, 
after  deducting  the  amount  of  the  commission, 
had  given  him  a  crossed  cheque,  was  the  only 
alloy  to  his  satisfaction. 

Rayne's  confidence  was  justified  and  the  Do- 
minion was  secured.  There  were  various  hopes 
that  were  not  fulfilled — either  the  salaries  asked 
were  prohibitive,  or  it  was  found  that  the  artists 
would  not  be  disengaged  soon  enough.  The 
"Lady  Maud"  on  whom  Oliphant  had  set  his 
heart  was  attacked  by  pleurisy  three  days  before 
the  date  of  the  first  rehearsal,  and  in  her  place 
was  Miss  Blanche  Ellerton,  whom  he  had  never 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  75 

seen,  and  who  was  by  comparison  unknown.  The 
morning  arrived,  however,  when  the  company 
assembled  at  the  theatre  to  hear  Royce  Oliphant 
read  his  play. 

He  arrived  early.  It  was  at  this  period  his 
constant  endeavour  to  avoid  all  the  faults  and 
affectations  that  he  had  execrated  in  others.  He 
had  rendered  himself  rather  a  nuisance  by  the 
earnestness  of  his  attempts  to  obtain  small  parts 
for  his  acquaintances,  who,  from  the  moment  the 
earliest  announcement  was  made,  besieged  him 
with  written  and  oral  reminders  of  their  exist- 
ence. That  he  had  not  succeeded  in  a  single 
instance  was  due  to  circumstances  that  he  could 
not  help;  but  the  failure  troubled  him,  and  he 
had  felt  that  his  explanations  must  sound  as 
hollow  to  his  former  colleagues  as  the  explana- 
tions of  his  present  associates  had  hitherto  ap- 
peared to  himself.    He  arrived  early. 

The  others  were  before  him,  though.  A  semi- 
circle of  chairs  had  been  formed  on  the  stage,  as 
if  in  readiness  for  a  minstrel  entertainment ;  and 
facing  it,  under  the  T-piece,  was  the  one  reserved 
for  himself.  Mr.  Rayne  made  several  remarks 
to  him,  which  he  believed  he  answered :  he  had  the 
vaguest  idea  of  their  tenor.  He  noted  a  pretty, 
fair  girl,  who  wore  a  feather  boa,  lifting  attentive 
eyes  to  him,  and  hoped  she  could  act.    He  saw 


76  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

the  manuscript  and  a  glass  of  water  on  the 
prompt-table,  and  shivered  as  the  patient  at  the 
dentist's  shivers  at  the  sight  of  the  forceps.  He 
approached  the  prompt-table — and  put  his  um- 
brella on  it !    He  had  touched  the  apex. 

"Good-morning,  ladies  and  gentlemen,"  he 
said,  in  a  voice  that  he  didn't  recognise. 

The  remembrance  assailed  him  that  more  than 
one  of  these  people  to  whom  he  was  about  to 
read  bore  names  that  were  household  words 
among  playgoers,  and  he  turned  suddenly  giddy. 
He  wished  that  Rayne  had  not  known  he  was 
an  actor,  for  he  was  certain  he  should  read  like 
an  amateur  of  the  worst  kind.  He  fumbled  with 
the  leaves  of  the  manuscript,  and  cleared  his 
throat,  and  sipped  the  water. 

"The  Impostor"  he  began. 

He  dashed  into  the  stage-directions,  which 
gave  him  a  moment  to  accustom  himself  to  the 
situation;  and  he  gabbled  them  vilely.  It  seemed 
to  him  five  minutes — in  reality  it  was  less  than 
thirty  seconds — before  he  had  his  voice  under 
control  at  all.  His  predominant  and  paralysing 
thought  was  that  everybody  would  be  bored  to 
death  hours  before  he  had  finished. 

To  read  a  play  well  is  an  achievement  of  which 
very  few  are  capable;  for  to  read  a  play  well 
means  to  render  perhaps  fifteen  parts,  and  the 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  77 

more  thoroughly  one  character  may  be  realised, 
the  more  difficult  it  becomes  to  change  instan- 
taneously to  the  next.  When  the  reader  is  the 
author  too,  sensitive  to  each  movement  of  every 
member  of  his  audience,  strained  to  sickness  with 
the  double  responsibility,  the  ordeal  is  beyond 
description.  It  was  twelve  o'clock  when  Oli- 
phant  sat  down;  it  was  four  o'clock  when,  after 
three  brief  intervals,  he  closed  the  covers  of  the 
last  act.  During  two  hours  he  knew  that  he  had 
done  the  best  of  which  he  was  capable.  He 
looked  up  at  the  girl  with  the  feather  boa,  and 
he  saw  that  to  her  thinking,  at  all  events,  The 
Impostor  spelt  success. 

There  was  a  hum  of  congratulation.  Every- 
body had  a  smile;  the  girl  exclaimed  feelingly, 
"Oh,  it's  beautiful!"  And  an  elderly  woman, 
who,  Oliphant  assumed  was  cast  for  "Lady 
Plynlimmon,"  said  with  quiet  authority,  "The 
play  is  sure — oh,  sure!"  at  which  Rayne  looked 
much  pleased. 

Then  there  were  introductions,  and  more  flat- 
tering comments  made.  And  at  last,  not  quite 
certain  whether  he  was  awake  or  in  a  dream, 
Oliphant  escaped  to  gulp  the  air,  after  hearing 
that  everyone  was  expected  at  twelve  again  the 
following  morning. 

It  might  be  imagined  that  the  rehearsals  would 


78  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

prove  no  novelty  to  him,  but  they  were  astound- 
ingly  new.  Familiar  things  were  all  at  once  pre- 
sented to  him  in  a  fresh  light — just  as  light  had 
been  shed  already  on  Mr.  Townsend's  behaviour 
at  the  West  Central.  A  rehearsal  here  was  as 
different  from  the  rehearsals  to  which  he  was 
used — as  different  from  a  rehearsal  at  the 
Queen's,  for  example — as  the  captain's  impres- 
sion of  the  voyage  is  from  a  passenger's. 
Hitherto  his  sole  anxiety  had  been  his  own  per- 
formance^— now  he  was  anxious  about  everyone's; 
and,  too  diffident  to  pull  up  the  artists  publicly 
in  order  to  obtain  the  inflections  he  desired,  his 
brain  swam  in  trying  to  remember  the  thousand- 
and-one  suggestions  he  wanted  to  make  to  them 
in  private.  He  was  harassed  day  and  night  by 
the  remembrance  of  warnings  about  something 
which  somebody  had  felt  it  "only  right"  to  utter. 
He  was  drawn  aside  by  "Lady  Plynlimmon"  to 
be  cautioned  that  the  stage-management  was 
ruining  her  most  important  scene;  Voysey,  the 
stage-manager,  informed  him  that  his  refusal  to 
have  incidental  music  was  going  to  "damn  the 
show";  and  Rayne  came  down  to  the  theatre  one 
morning  with  the  opinion  that  the  "hero  was  an 
unmitigated  blackguard."  Even  when  the  inci- 
dental music  was  conceded,  it  was  not  the  end  of 
the  matter.    Oliphant  derived  his  principal  com- 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  79 

pensation  from  watching  the  rehearsals  of  the 
girl  with  the  feather  boa,  who  had  proved  to  be 
Blanche  Ellerton.  Though  she  was  not  more 
than  three  or  four  and  twenty,  her  performance 
promised  to  be  admirable — in  fact,  she  was  an 
ideal  "Maud."  Her  girlishness  was  so  "natural," 
her  pathos  was  so  unforced,  that  she  delighted 
him.  So  when  she  turned  to  him  one  day  in 
excitement  and  despair,  he  was  ready  to  take 
her  side  before  he  had  heard  what  her  grievance 
was. 

"Oh,  Mr.  Oliphant,"  she  exclaimed,  "please, 
please  tell  Mr.  Voysey  that  that  awful  number 
they  play  through  my  soliloquy  won't  do!  It 
kills  it.  I  simply  can't  act  if  they  play  it.  The 
situation  wants  something  plaintive,  and  Mr. 
Van  Putten  has  written  a  jig!" 

Oliphant  hadn't  remarked  the  incongruity,  and 
said  so. 

"Well,  ask  him  to  let  you  hear  it.  Will  you? 
Do!" 

"Certainly  I  will,"  he  answered;  "I'll  ask  him 
now." 

The  conductor  was  sitting  by  the  piano  at  the 
opposite  corner  of  the  stage,  and  Oliphant  went 
over  to  him. 

"Mr.  Van  Putten,"  he  said,  "I  wish  you'd  let 


80  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

me  hear  one  of  the  numbers  you've  written.  Do 
you  mind?" 

"Zo?"  said  the  conductor  coldly.  He  inquired 
which  number  it  was. 

Miss  Ellerton  joined  them.  "Number  three," 
she  said. 

"Ha,  ha!"  said  Mr.  Van  Putten;  "dee  lady 
find  zomeding  wrong  mid  it,  yes?  Ha,  ha!  Zir, 
I  'ave  gombosed  dee  music  for  all  dee  brincibal 
deatres  in  London ;  but  dee  gombany  knows  best, 
ain't  it?    Zo,  I  vill  blay  it!" 

He  did.  In  describing  it  as  a  "jig"  the  actress 
had  exaggerated,  but  not  more  wildly  than  was 
pardonable  in  the  artistic  temperament. 

"It's  very  fine,"  said  Oliphant;  "yes,  thank 
you.  Still,  I  fancy  that  for  the  situation  some- 
thing a  little  slower  would  be  better;  it  doesn't 
quite  fit  the  lines.  Perhaps  you've  noticed  it 
yourself?" 

"What's  the  matter?"  demanded  Mr.  Voysey. 

"Dee  audor  and  dee  lady  gomblain  of  dee 
music." 

Without  any  premonitory  symptoms  Mr.  Voy- 
sey exploded.  The  conductor  posed  resignedly, 
with  the  offending  number  drooping  from  his 
hand.  The  rehearsal  was  stopped,  and  a  heated 
argument  continued  for  five  minutes.  Rayne 
agreed  with  everybody  all  at  once. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  81 

"It's  Miss  Ellerton's  scene,"  repeated  Oli- 
phant,  "and  if  she  doesn't  feel  the  number  it 
ought  to  be  changed.  We  can't  sacrifice  the 
actress  to  the  incidental  music  1" 

"Oh,  that's  enough,  Mr.  OliphantI"  cried  the 
stage-manager.  "All  right,  all  right,  all  right! 
I've  had  thirty-five  years'  experience  in  the  pro- 
fession, but  I'm  always  ready  to  learn.  Produce 
the  piece  your  way!  I  may  as  well  go  home,  as 
I  don't  know  my  business." 

However,  he  picked  up  the  manuscript  again 
at  the  same  moment.  Miss  Ellerton  had  gained 
her  point,  and  the  rehearsal  was  resumed. 

"You  got  me  into  nice  trouble,"  Oliphant  said 
to  her  by  and  by. 

"Oh,  it  was  so  good  of  you!"  she  answered 
radiantly.  "But  wasn't  it  hideous?  It  set  one's 
teeth  on  edge." 

"It  was  a  trifle  weird,"  he  agreed. 

"You  don't  know  how  grateful  I  am!  I 
couldn't,  I  simply  couldn't  have  acted  to  that 
ghastly  noise.  .  .  .  Have  you  seen  the  boy  any- 
where lately?" 

"Do  you  want  anything?" 

"I  want  him  to  fetch  me  a  bun.  I'm  famished, 
and  we  shan't  get  away  till  five  if  we're  going 
through  the  last  act." 

"Let  me  go  for  you.    What  shall  I  bring?" 


82  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"Will  you?  Oh,  just  a  bun,  please;  that's  all. 
Thanks  awfully!" 

So  he  brought  a  box  of  cakes  from  a  neigh- 
bouring confectioner's,  and  she  handed  it  round 
to  the  other  women,  and  then  came  back  to  offer 
it  again  to  him.  She  stood  beside  him  in  the 
wings,  eating  chocolate  eclairs,  and  discussing 
the  frocks  she  was  to  wear  in  the  part.  She  was 
pretty  enough  to  be  attractive,  even  while  she 
ate  a  chocolate  eclair. 


CHAPTER  VI 

When  the  Wednesday  dawned  for  which  the 
dress-rehearsal  was  fixed,  Oliphant  rose  in  a  state 
of  tension  which  he  knew  was  to  continue  for 
thirty-six  hours — until  the  curtain  fell  the  follow- 
ing night  on  the  production.  His  remembrance 
of  these  thirty-six  hours  was  always  vague.  A 
salient  feature  was  Mr.  Voysey's  silk  hat  at  the 
back  of  his  head,  as  he  stood,  on  Wednesday 
morning,  doing  nothing  anxiously  in  the  centre 
of  "Lady  Plynlimmon's"  hall;  the  brilliantly- 
lighted  scene,  in  which  he  was  the  solitary  figure, 
and  the  gloom  of  the  auditorium  formed  a  strik- 
ing contrast.  There  was  a  sprinkling  of  curious 
strangers  in  the  stalls.  And  when  the  rehearsal 
began  at  last,  everything  went  wrong — every- 
thing except  the  performance  of  Miss  Ellerton. 
Even  Rayne  was  not  so  good  as  the  author  had 
expected  him  to  be ;  and  others  did  not  know  their 
parts;  and  terrible  omissions  were  discovered 
which  could  never  be  remedied  in  time.  At  five 
o'clock,  when  Oliphant  went  back  to  Burton 
Crescent,  he  was  bowed  with  despondence. 

83 


84.  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

Thursday  drew  towards  dusk  tardily.  He  had 
strolled  about  the  streets  till  he  was  tired,  and, 
still  too  restless  to  sit  down,  he  now  paced  the 
drawing-room,  staring  with  strained  eyes  at  the 
darkening  enclosure  beyond  the  windows.  He 
thought  that  he  wanted  somebody — anybody — 
to  talk  to ;  but  when  Mrs.  Tubbs  brought  in  the 
inevitable  tea  and  toast,  her  chatter  drove  him 
to  the  verge  of  frenzy. 

"I  suppose  you  can't  help  thinking  about  it, 
Mr.  Elephant,"  she  said,  "and  being  a  bit  worried 
like?  Well,  you're  fine  and  large  on  the  bills, 
that  you  are !  Mrs.  Johnson  she  was  saying  only 
yesterday — you've  heard  me  speak  o'  Mrs.  John- 
son?— the  lady  as  does  your  washing — she  was 
saying  only  yesterday  she  never  see  a  strikinger 
bill  in  her  life;  and  she's  what  you  may  call  a 
reg'lar  playgoer,  mind  yer!  Is  it  a  laughable 
piece  { 

"No,"  he  said  huskily;  "it  isn't  meant  to  be 
comic.    I  don't  think  I  want  any  tea,  thank  you." 

"Lor,  you  must  eat  a  bit — whatever  are  you 
talking  about!  I  suppose  if  it  takes,  you'll  be 
making  a  lot  o'  money,  won't  you?  I  do  wonder 
you  ain't  acting  in  it  yourself — seems  so  strange. 
Mrs.  Johnson  she  was  asking  me  which  of  the 
parts  you  took,  and  when  I  said  you  hadn't  got 
nothin'  to  do  with  it,  she  was  that  surprised! 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  85 

Well,  me  and  her  '11  both  be  there,  anyhow;  I 
give  her  a  ticket,  and  we  mean  to  clap  like  one 
o'clock,  I  can  tell  yer!" 

"For  heaven's  sake,"  he  exclaimed  agitatedly, 
"don't  go  clapping  all  by  yourselves!  Don't, 
I  beg  you!"  The  toast  choked  hiiri,  and  it  was 
necessary  to  obtain  a  respite.  "I'll  go  and  dress," 
he  declared. 

"Better  'ad,"  said  Mrs.  Tubbs;  "Mrs.  Johnson 
she  'as  took  especial  pains  with  your  shirt — you'll 
find  it  at  the  top  of  the  parcel.  I  know  the  sink- 
ing you've  got,  Mr.  Elephant — 'aving  'ad  it  my- 
self. Never  shall  I  forget  the  night  as  'er  as  is 
gone  left  this  very  'ouse  to  make  her  first  appear- 
ance before  the  public,  with  me  and  'er  uncle 
a-followin'  of  her,  a  mask  o'  perspiration  in  the 
bus !  And  the  talent  o'  that  gal  was  astonishin', 
though  little  more  than  showing  of  'erself  off 
'ad  she  got  to  do.  And  if  it  'adn't  been  that  Mr. 
Tubbs  was  the  tool  of  Mr.  Billing,  it's  at  the 
Al'ambra  or  somewhere  she'd  'ave " 

The  quiet  and  coolness  of  the  bedroom  was 
refreshing.  By  maddening  degrees  another  hour 
crept  by.  Presently  it  wasn't  ridiculous  to  con- 
sider starting  for  the  theatre.  He  had  intended 
to  take  a  hansom,  as  befitting  the  occasion,  but 
suddenly  he  preferred  to  walk.  He  did  not  mean 
to  go  behind  the  scenes  until  after  the  perform' 


86  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

ance;  to  show  himself  earlier  would  be  only  to 
increase  the  nervousness  of  the  company.  In  the 
Strand  he  had  a  liqueur  of  brandy,  and  bought 
a  cigar,  and  consulted  his  watch,  which  he  had 
taken  out  of  pawn,  a  dozen  times. 

The  crowd  outside  the  pit  and  gallery  was 
large — he  wondered  with  a  pang  how  many 
orders  it  might  represent.  The  people  surged 
forward  as  he  speculated  on  the  point,  and  a 
flood  of  light  was  cast  upon  the  pavement  from 
the  centre  doors,  which  opened  noisily  and  dis- 
played the  foyer.  The  commissionaire  who 
opened  them  was  very  tall  and  fat,  and  his  but- 
tons shone;  Oliphant  noticed  that.  The  gleam 
of  the  acting-manager's  shirt-front,  and  the  blue 
scarf  over  the  head  of  an  early  arrival  in  a  four- 
wheel  cab,  also  impressed  him,  like  the  artificial 
redness  of  a  bank  of  roses  at  the  foot  of  a  gilt 
looking-glass  when  he  entered.  There  was  a  tele- 
gram for  him  in  the  box-office,  and  it  slipped 
from  his  fingers  three  times  before  he  mastered 
it.  It  ran :  "I'm  drinking  your  health.  Heartiest 
wishes  for  a  thundering  success  to-night — Otho." 
It  was  sent  from  Paris.  At  the  top  of  the  stairs 
he  handed  it  to  the  programme-girl  instead  of 
his  ticket,  and  tried  to  smile  when  the  mistake 
was  pointed  out ;  his  lips  felt  very  stiff. 

He  sat  in  the  dress-circle,  and  listened  to  the 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  87 

clatter  of  feet  overhead,  as  the  gallery-patrons 
stumbled  down  the  wooden  steps.  After  an 
eternity,  when  the  orchestra  appeared,  and  the 
first  preliminary  scrape  of  a  fiddle  wrung  his 
heart,  he  understood  the  sickness  of  the  soul 
which  so  often  prevents  a  dramatist  attending 
the  production  of  his  play.  Hitherto  he  had 
ridiculed  it;  now  he  understood.  Momentarily 
he  entertained  the  idea  of  going  away,  but  a 
feeling  of  physical  weakness,  as  muc^  as  curi- 
osity, held  him  chained. 

The  stalls  were  rapidly  filling,  and  occasionally 
there  was  the  sharp  rattle  of  rings,  as  an  attend- 
ant preceded  a  party  into  a  private  box.  Mr. 
Van  Putten  emerged;  he  settled  his  coat-tails. 
He  tapped  with  the  baton,  and  collected  eyes. 
The  orchestra  emitted  a  feeble  wail.  It  grew 
louder ;  it  acquired  time,  and  tune ;  it  culminated 
in  a  crash.  The  author  gripped  the  arms  of  his 
chair — and  the  curtain  rose. 

The  scene  glowed  before  him  as  it  had  done 
yesterday;  the  women  were  there — and  they 
spoke;  so  much  he  knew.  Whether  they  spoke 
the  lines  well,  or  whether  they  spoke  the  words 
that  he  had  written,  he  did  not  know  in  the 
least.  He  thought  that  if  the  actresses'  nervous- 
ness had  equalled  his  own  they  would  have  been 
tongue-tied;  but  they  had — as  he  had  always 


88  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

had  till  now — the  stimulus  of  the  footlights.  .  .  . 
Gradually  his  mind  became  acuter;  he  waited 
for  an  inflection,  and  looked  for  the  next  "en- 
trance." It  was  "Maud's";  God!  was  Maud 
late? 

"  'Maud  is  here,  mother;  and  very  impatient 
for  tea!'" 

Ah!  she  was  on  the  staircase — she  came  down 
it  slowly,  her  finger-tips  trailing  the  balustrade. 
How  graceful  she  was !  How  charming  a  figure, 
as  she  smiled  across  the  table!  .  .  .  There  was 
a  ripple  of  laughter  as  "Lady  Plynlimmon"  let 
fall  an  epigram  with  an  air  of  unconsciousness 
that  gave  it  twice  its  point.  .  .  .  Rayne — look- 
ing very  handsome  in  "pink" — was  welcomed  en- 
thusiastically. .  .  .  To  find  that  "Sir  Clement" 
wasn't  Sir  Clement  at  all  startled  the  audience 
as  it  was  meant  to  do,  and  an  audible  stir  ran 
through  the  theatre.  The  author's  agitation  had 
a  throb  of  enjoyment  in  it  now;  yesterday's 
blunders  were  avoided — the  piece  was  going 
without  a  hitch ! 

He  did  not  go  to  smoke  in  the  interval;  nor 
in  the  next.  He  sat  longing  to  grip  Rayne  and 
everybody  else  by  the  hand.  He  had  misjudged 
Rayne!  The  whole  company  was  doing  valiant 
work,  and  the  applause  had  been  of  the  warmest 
description. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  89 

The  act-drop  went  up  for  the  third  time,  and 
"Maud"  and  the  man  who  called  himself  Sir 
Clement  Thurloe  were  "discovered"  on  the  anni- 
versary of  their  wedding-day.  Rayne  and  Miss 
Ellerton  were  both  excellent  here.  His  hunger 
for  the  love  of  the  wife  whom  he  had  bought  by 
his  fraud,  and  her  own  awakening  tenderness, 
were  depicted  admirably.  Soon  her  dislike  of 
"Mrs.  Vaughan" — the  man's  embarrassment 
when  questioned — fanned  a  mistaken  fear  to 
jealousy.  The  girl's  voice  as  she  turned  to  "Lady 
Plynlimmon"  with  the  cry  of  "Mother!  You 
made  me  marry  him — tell  me  if  it's  true!" 
brought  Oliphant's  heart  into  his  throat.  She 
was  displaying  an  intensity  that  astonished  even 
him.  For  the  end  of  the  act — the  whirlwind 
of  despair — he  relied  on  Rayne.  But  another 
scene  had  to  come  first:  the  "scene  of  the  two 
women,"  when  "Maud"  declined  to  receive  "Mrs. 
Vaughan,"  and  the  adventuress,  in  retaliation, 
flung  the  truth  in  her  hostess's  face  and  told  her 
that  she  was  the  wife  of  an  impostor.  The  scene 
came  which  was  to  be  made  or  marred  by  Miss 
Blanche  Ellerton. 

And  now  she  held  the  house;  and  Oliphant 
worshipped  her.  The  girl  who  had  eaten  choco- 
late eclairs,  and  talked  theatrical  slang  in  the 
wings,  bore  herself  like  a  queen.     Every  word 


90  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

she  uttered,  every  quiver  of  the  proudly-set 
lips,  struck  a  chord  in  his  own  being.  His  life 
seemed  a  part  of  her — to  flutter  with  her  breath. 
The  act — the  play — ended  somehow;  he  thought 
of  no  one  but  her. 

He  fancied  there  was  a  cry  of  "Author"  when 
he  made  his  way  "behind"  after  the  curtain  fell. 
The  artists  were  all  on  the  stage — all  with  their 
nerves  strung  high;  the  eyes  that  some  of  the 
women  turned  to  him  were  wet  as  he  stammered 
his  thanks.  He  loved  everybody;  the  members 
of  the  company  were  his  brothers  and  sisters  1 
Rayne  clapped  him  on  the  shoulder,  and  sounded 
imperative — Oliphant  didn't  understand  about 
what.  All  he  realised  vividly  was  that  Blanche 
Ellerton  was  standing  among  the  group,  waiting 
for  him  to  reach  her.  He  took  both  her  hands 
and  could  have  fallen  at  her  feet. 

"Oh,  God  bless  you!"  he  gasped. 

"Was  I  what  you  meant?" 

"You  were  great — what  can  I  say? — you  were 
great!" 

"For  Heaven's  sake,  man,  come!"  Rayne 
wrenched  him  round;  "they  want  the  author — 
take  your  call!" 

He  was  dragged  before  the  audience,  and  made 
his  bow. 

She  was  there  when  he  came  off — not  queenly 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  91 

any  longer,  but  a  girl  with  paint  on  her  face,  and 
a  tear  trickling  down  it.  "Good-night,"  she  said. 
"I  think  it's  a  success?" 

"Thanks  to  you"  he  muttered.  He  caught 
her  hands  to  his  mouth,  and  kissed  them  violently. 
"There  are  no  words  to  tell  you  how  grateful  I 
am — no  words!    Good  night,  Miss  Ellerton." 

It  occurred  to  him  afterwards  that  a  diplo- 
matist would  have  bestowed  his  superlative  bene- 
diction on  the  manager ;  but  he  didn't  care  I 


CHAPTER  VII 

When  Mrs.  Tubbs  came  into  his  room  with 
the  bundle  of  newspapers  that  he  had  ordered 
overnight,  Oliphant  sat  up  in  bed  and  grabbed 
them;  and  the  more  he  read  the  blanker  grew 
his  dismay.  Not  one  of  the  Press  opinions  of 
The  Impostor  was  wholly  favourable,  and  the 
maj  ority  were  decidedly  the  reverse.  The  actors 
and  actresses,  of  course,  were  complimented, 
especially  Miss  Ellerton — The  Daily  Telegraph 
was  reminded  of  Aimee  Desclee — but  the  dra- 
matic critics  were  not  so  diffident  of  disparaging 
the  author;  and  after  breakfast,  when  the  eve- 
ning papers  were  published,  one  of  the  notices 
was  headed,  "Claude  Melnotte  in  a  Chimney- 
pot Hat." 

The  author  walked  down  to  the  Dominion  in 
the  morning,  because  he  felt  that  it  would  be 
cowardly  to  stay  away;  and  he  had  a  brief, 
dejected  chat  with  Rayne  in  the  office.  To  go 
to  the  theatre  at  night,  however,  and  see  the 
company  flat,  and  the  house  three-parts  empty, 

92 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  93 

was  beyond  him.  He  wondered  if  Miss  Ellerton 
was  sympathising  with  him  in  his  failure.  She 
could  afford  to  do  so;  The  Impostor  had  at  any 
rate  been  a  triumph  for  her.  He  would  go 
to-morrow!  He  fancied  what  she  would  say 
and  what  he  would  answer,  and  foresaw  her  reply 
to  that.  He  found  that  he  was  looking  forward 
to  their  conversation  very  eagerly. 

But  it  was  not  quite  so  charming  as  he  had 
expected.  She  said  that  "the  bad  notices  of  the 
piece  were  an  awful  shame,"  but  he  could  not 
avoid  perceiving  that  her  mind  was  chiefly  occu- 
pied by  the  good  notices  of  herself.  The  con- 
versation approached  his  imaginary  picture  more 
closely  when  he  congratulated  her  on  her  success ; 
then  she  was  again  animated.  He  was  relieved 
to  hear  that  the  audience  was  not  so  scanty  as 
he  had  feared  it  would  be ;  and  when  the  acting- 
manager  came  round  with  the  returns  Rayne 
perked  up,  and  spoke  hopefully  of  "pulling  the 
thing  together  yet." 

It  was  his  first  play;  the  atmosphere  of  a 
theatre  had  grown  essential  to  him;  and  man 
knows  no  wilder  adoration  than  a  dramatist  may 
feel  for  the  actress  who  realises  his  heroine — the 
Dominion  drew  Royce  Oliphant  like  a  loadstone. 
He  watched  Blanche  Ellerton  from  the  wings 
while  she  was  on  the  stage,  and  talked  to  her 


94  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

in  the  wings  when  she  came  off,  and  found  the 
wings  a  void  when  she  was  in  her  dressing-room. 
The  not  uncommon  delusion  that  to  obtain 
disenchantment  it  is  only  needful  to  view  the 
make-up  on  an  actress's  face  at  close  quarters, 
is  the  reverse  of  the  truth  instead  of  a  fact. 
She  is  probably  far  better-looking  so — there  in 
that  light — than  she  is  by  nature — and  the  con- 
sciousness that  she  is  made  up,  moreover,  is  by 
no  means  active  in  the  spectator's  mind.  At  the 
rehearsals  Miss  Ellerton  had  been  a  pretty  girl; 
here  she  was  a  beautiful  woman.  Very  soon, 
indeed,  Oliphant  came  to  remember  her  as  she 
was  here  and  altogether  forgot  the  comparatively 
insipid  face  which  belonged  to  her  by  rights.  It 
was  a  little  shock  to  him  the  first  time  he  saw 
her  again  in  her  own  person — they  had  met  in 
Oxford  Street.  But  for  the  glamour  of  her 
identity,  which  nothing  could  destroy — the 
knowledge  that  she  was  the  girl  who  inside  the 
theatre  affected  him  so  powerfully — he  would 
have  felt  the  meeting  sad. 

None  the  less  he  was  delighted  a  few  evenings 
later  when  she  mentioned  that  her  home  was  at 
Earl's  Court  and  it  was  understood  that  he  was 
to  call  there  some  afternoon. 

He  went  the  following  Sunday — he  would 
have  gone  before  but  for  the  dread  of  showing 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  95 

himself  impatient.  The  house  that  sheltered  the 
goddess  when  he  reached  it  was  not  imposing; 
but  as  he  waited  in  the  little  drawing-room,  with 
its  dyed  grasses,  and  photographs  of  Blanche 
Ellerton  on  the  mantelpiece,  he  smoothed  his  hair 
a  trifle  nervously. 

She  came  in  to  him  a  moment  afterwards,  and 
they  exchanged  preliminary  platitudes.  She  was 
followed  by  her  parents,  and  a  sallow,  unattrac- 
tive girl  of  about  twenty,  with  high  shoulders 
and  a  flat  chest,  who,  he  learnt  with  surprise, 
was  her  sister.  There  was  tea,  and,  on  his  part 
at  least,  uneasiness. 

Mrs.  Ellerton  was  a  thin,  simple-looking 
woman,  prematurely  grey.  Her  destiny  was 
to  write  novelettes  to  order.  Novelettes  that 
filled  a  couple  of  pages — longer  novelettes  issued 
at  a  halfpenny,  between  blue,  pink,  and  green 
wrappers — novelettes  that  were  "To  be  con- 
tinued in  our  next,"  all  came  alike  to  her  pen. 
She  took  pleasure  in  the  work,  and  was  ashamed 
to  be  pleased  by  it,  for  she  was  keenly  sensitive 
to  ridicule.  She  was  consoled  by  remembering 
that  the  money  she  obtained  was  indispensable. 
Blanche  had  earned  a  little  as  a  child-actress 
before  she  was  eleven,  but  the  five  pounds  a 
week  she  was  drawing  from  the  Dominion  was 
the  highest  salary  to  which  she  had  attained, 


96  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

and  there  were  many  months  in  which  she  earned 
nothing  at  all. 

The  head  of  the  family — the  husband  of  the 
lady  novelettist — was  James  Ellerton;  he  fre- 
quently reminded  her  of  it — in  fact,  it  was  his 
misfortune  that  he  could  never  forget  it  himself. 
He  had  formerly  been  a  provincial  actor — a  call- 
ing he  loathed — and  as  a  provincial  actor  he 
might  have  contributed  towards  the  household 
expenses  to-day.  Unhappily,  some  ten  years 
since,  he  had  written  a  very  clever  novel,  which 
evoked  most  excellent  reviews,  and  of  which  the 
publishers  sold  the  fewest  possible  number  of 
copies.  For  a  writer  who  had  been  likened  to 
Balzac — and  he  was — to  continue  to  make  a  fool 
of  himself  on  third-rate  theatrical  tours,  or  to 
say,  "The  dinner  is  served,  madam,"  in  London, 
he  had  felt  to  be  incongruous.  James  Ellerton, 
in  the  Saturday  Review,  was  "a  distinguished 
novelist";  James  Ellerton,  in  the  theatre,  was  a 
nonentity  to  be  snubbed  and  bullied.  His  suc- 
cess in  literature  gained  him  no  jot  of  considera- 
tion from  stage-managers  and  dramatic-agents — 
as  the  adaptation  of  a  French  melodrama  would 
have  done — for  the  simple  reason  that  none  of 
them  knew  anything  whatever  about  it.  He  had, 
therefore,  retired  from  the  theatrical  profession; 
and   at   very   lengthy   intervals   produced   two 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  97 

further  novels,  which  were  reviewed  highly  also, 
and  much  admired — by  the  reviewers.  Few 
other  persons  had  heard  of  them.  He  was  sup- 
ported, fitfully  by  the  exertions  of  his  elder 
daughter,  and  for  the  most  part  by  his  wife's 
novelettes,  whose  literary  quality  caused  him 
acute  disgust.  She  mentioned  them  in  his  pres- 
ence deprecatingly. 

"It's  so  nice  to  see  you,  Mr.  Oliphant,"  she 
said.  "We  were  all  in  front  the  first  night,  of 
course.  I  do  hope  it  will  go  on!  Do  you  think 
it  will?" 

"I  think  that  Miss  Ellerton's  performance 
alone  ought  to  be  enough  to  draw  all  London," 
he  said. 

"Oh,  how  lovely  of  you  to  say  so!  She's 
worked  so  hard,  Blanche  has;  and  she's  never 
had  what  I  call  a  'real  chance'  till  now.  But 
the  drama  is  so  good  in  itself!  I'm  sure  it  ought 
to  run.  Mr.  Ellerton  thought  highly  of  it ;  didn't 
you,  James?" 

Mr.  Ellerton  had  been  considering — as  he 
always  did  consider  on  being  introduced  to  any- 
one— how  to  intimate  that  he  was  "a  distin- 
guished novelist";  and  he  was  grateful  to  her 
for  making  the  opportunity.  It  would  have  been 
beneath  his  dignity  to  let  her  see  it,  however; 
the  fiction  of  his  importance — the  importance  of 


98  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

his  fiction — was  maintained  on  the  domestic 
hearth. 

"The  literary  quality  of  the  dialogue,"  he  said 
impressively,  "of  course  appealed  to  me.  There 
are  lines  that  I  would  have  written  myself." 

"I'm  glad  you  liked  it,"  said  Oliphant;  "yes." 
He  saw  that  the  others  were  of  the  opinion  that 
the  elderly  gentleman  had  paid  him  a  great  com- 
pliment, and  was  a  little  puzzled.  The  father 
wrote,  then? — that  was  why  he  wore  a  brown 
velvet  jacket. 

"Papa  doesn't  often  praise  a  piece,  I  can  tell 
you !"  said  Blanche.  "He's  so  fiendishly  critical. 
You  know  his  books?" 

"I — I  know  the  books  in  a  sense,"  murmured 
Oliphant.  "I'm  ashamed  to  say  I  haven't  read 
them." 

"There  are  some  millions,"  said  Mr.  Ellerton 
with  a  fine  smile,  "in  the  same  position."  He 
always  said  this,  and  said  it  rather  well.  "I 
am  not — er — popular,  Mr.  Oliphant — I  won't 
say  'successful,'  for,  as  a  detail,  my  novels  obtain 
their — er — columns  of  eulogy  in  all  the  impor- 
tant papers."  He  waved  the  papers  aside.  "I 
have  never  consented  to  cheapen  my  style  from 
commercial  motives.  It  may  be  a  weakness.  I 
may  be  wrong." 

"I  think  it's  the  reverse,"  declared  Oliphant; 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  99 

"very  much  the  reverse.  To  know  he  can  afford 
to  do  his  best  work  must  be  a  literary  man's 
greatest  joy." 

Mr.  Ellerton  bent  his  head,  and  smiled  again — 
ineffably. 

"It  is,"  he  said. 

"Oh,  we're  a  very  brilliant  family,"  laughed 
the  actress;  "you've  no  idea!" 

"Do  you  write  as  well,  Mrs.  Ellerton?" 

"Oh,  only  a  little,"  she  faltered;  "my  writing 

is My  husband  is  the  author.    I  write  for 

papers;  I've  no  time  to  think  about  a  book." 

"You  write  more  than  a  'little'  then?" 

"Well,  they  keep  me  busy,"  she  confessed 
nervously;  "don't  they,  James?  Did  I  tell  you 
that  there's  a  note  from  Mr.  Trussell  asking  for 
a  ten-thousand-word  story  as  soon  as  I  can  let 
him  have  it?" 

"How  long  does  a  story  like  that  take  to  do?" 
Oliphant  inquired. 

Under  the  influence  of  polite  interest — an  in- 
fluence to  which  she  was  so  unaccustomed — the 
simple  woman  grew  expansive.  "Oh,  not  very 
long,  if  I  keep  at  it;  and  I  do  when  I've  begun! 
Of  course  my  tales  aren't — aren't — what  is  the 
word,  James?" 

"  'Serious,'  "  said  the  authority  carelessly. 

"Yes,  aren't  'serious,'  "   she  continued,  win- 


100  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

cing — "in  a  literary  sense  my  husband  means. 
They're — they're  written  to  suit  the  class  of 
papers  that  want  me;  but  they  take  hold  of  me 
while  I'm  doing  them;  and  I  don't  like  to  put 
them  down." 

"I  can  understand  the  fascination  very  well," 
answered  the  young  man.  "To  keep  seeing  one- 
self in  print,  too,  must  be  jolly !" 

"The  characters  seem  quite  real  to  me"  she 
said,  "and — and  it's  exciting  when  one  gets  them 
into  some  dreadful  trouble,  and  doesn't  quite 
know  how  they're  going  to  get  out  of  it.  One 
doesn't  worry,  you  know !  There  are  nights  when 
I  can't  sleep  because  I  keep  asking  myself  how 

the  heroine's  going  to  be  saved,  and "     She 

saw  her  husband's  expression,  and  changed  colour 
pathetically.  "But  it's  absurd  to  talk  about  my 
writing  in  front  of  Mr.  Ellerton!  I  only  play 
at  it." 

"My  wife's  work  has — er — has  its  merits," 
admitted  the  introspective  novelist  whom  it  kept. 
"It  really  isn't  so  bad  as  some  of  the  stuff  these 
papers  trade  in;  I  hope  to  see  both  her  and 
Blanche  advance  considerably.  And — if  you 
persevere,  Mr.  Oliphant — I  think  there's  some- 
body else  I  shall  have  to  congratulate  one  of 
these  days!" 

"It  won't  be  on  my  plays,"   said  Oliphant 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  101 

shortly;  "I'm  an  actor."  He  was  sorry  to  be 
conscious  that  he  felt  the  visit  was  proving  very 
dull. 

All  this  time  the  girl  in  the  background  had 
said  nothing  except  "How  do  you  do?"  but  sat 
regarding  Oliphant  with  hungry  eyes.  Though 
she  was  accustomed  to  men  ignoring  her,  she 
yearned  to  be  noticed  by  them,  and  she  had 
always  a  passionate  hope  that  the  last  one  intro- 
duced would  be  the  exception  to  the  rule.  The 
attention  secured  by  her  sister's  brightness,  her 
father's  self-assertion,  even  by  her  mother's  small 
talk,  accentuated  the  force  of  her  secret  mortifi- 
cation. Life  contained  for  her  but  one  brief 
excitement.  It  was  when  she  stood  up  in  com- 
pany and  played,  in  an  amateurish,  untrained 
way,  some  simple  air  on  her  violin,  trembling  to 
know  that  now,  at  least,  men  looked  at  her.  At 
these  moments  there  was,  in  the  breast  of  the 
semi-deformed  girl,  the  tumult  of  triumph  and 
despair  that  belongs  to  a  Paganini.  But  her  skill 
was  of  the  slightest,  and  nobody  suspected,  as 
she  scraped  "The  Last  Rose  of  Summer,"  that 
she  felt  much  more  than  a  mechanical  toy. 

"Gertrude,"  said  Mrs.  Ellerton  now,  with  a 
glance  in  her  direction,  "came  home  from  the 
Dominion  hysterical.  How  she  cried  there  1  So 
did  I — I  always  do — but  Gertrude  sobbed." 


102  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"Did  you,  Miss  Ellerton?'' 

She  turned  sick  with  the  intensity  of  her  desire 
to  say  something  "good" — something  that  should 
stimulate  his  interest.  She  clasped  her  hands  in 
her  lap  with  an  unspoken  prayer. 

"Yes,"  she  said  huskily,  her  face  suffused  with 
an  unbecoming  blush. 

"I  wish  it  had  been  your  business  to  write 
some  of  the  notices.  You'd  have  dealt  more 
kindly  with  me." 

"Yes,"  she  said. 

"The  receipts  are  going  up  a  little  every  eve- 
ning, though,  lately;  perhaps  it  may  turn  out 
well  after  all — it's  possible.    One  can't  say." 

"No,"  she  said. 

"I  wonder  how  much  money  Rayne  has  got?" 
exclaimed  the  leading  lady;  "do  you  think  he  can 
afford  to  wait  till  it  works  up  into  a  draw?  But 
I  oughtn't  to  ask  you  that." 

"As  a  matter  of  fact  I  don't  know,"  Oliphant 
answered. 

"He  ought  to  advertise  it  more.  There  are 
no  advertisements — none  to  speak  of.  And — oh, 
these  managers,  these  managers!" 

"What  were  you  going  to  say?" 

"Well,  the  advertisements  he  does  put  in — 
look  at  all  the  lines  from  the  notices  that  he 
quotes!     They're  not  the  best,  they're  not  the 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  103 

finest  by  any  means:  because  the  best  notices 
were  got  by  me,  and  he  doesn't  want  to  advertise 
anybody  but  himself.  'Herbert  Rayne's  Latest 
Success!'  And  what  of  the  author  of  the  piece, 
and  poor  Blanche  Ellerton?" 

"I'm  afraid  the  author  of  the  piece  can't  lay 
claim  to  many  good  notices,"  he  laughed. 

Her  mother  despatched  a  warning  glance. 
"Blanche  is  so  frank,  Mr.  Oliphant,"  she  mur- 
mured; "she  says  too  much  sometimes." 

"Oh,  Mr.  Oliphant  won't  tell  tales  out  of 
school,  I  know!  Have  I  been  indiscreet,  Mr. 
Oliphant?"    She  smiled  bewitchingly. 

"Why,  I  thought  we  were  friends?"  he  said. 

"I  feel  perfectly  safe  in  Mr.  Oliphant's  hands 
— I'm  not  alarmed!  But  isn't  it  so?  The  lines 
that  would  tell  go  into  the  waste-paper  basket. 
You  know  what  the  critics  said  of  me !  Did  you 
see  The  World?  Oh,  did  you  see  The  World? 
I  must  show  it  you!    Where  is  it,  mother?" 

"Yes,  I  saw  it,"  he  said;  "I  brought  you  the 
cutting,  if  you  remember." 

"Oh,  so  you  did — so  kind  of  you!  Well" — 
her  gesture  was  perhaps  a  little  unrestrained  for 
a  room — "these  things  aren't  advertised,  and 
there  ought  to  be  half  a  column  of  them  in  all 
the  papers!  I've  suffered  in  the  same  way  all 
through  my  career.    They  won't,  they  won't  let 


104  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

you  get  a  better  adjective  than  themselves — the 
vanity  of  a  management  is  simply  appalling!" 

"7  have  never  written  for  the  theatre  on  that 
account,"  observed  the  novelist;  "I  wouldn't  do 
it.  I  would  not  consent  to  stultify  my  intention 
because  an  actor-manager  demanded  that  he 
should  be  in  the  centre  of  the  stage  when  he  ought 
to  be  in  his  dressing-room.  I  always  say  one 
thing;  I  say:  'Come  to  me  when  you  can  forget 
that  you  are  managing  this  house  for  your  own 

glorification and  then  I'll  write  you  a  play. 

In  the  meanwhile,  my  dear  sir,  no!  You  don't 
suit  me,  and  7  shouldn't  suit  you.''  They  may 
be  offended ;  but  I  say  what  I  mean." 

"My  husband  won't  give  in,"  boasted  Mrs. 
Ellerton  feebly.    "He'll  never  give  in." 

"No!  Those  are  my  principles,  and  I  shall 
keep  true  to  them.  Possibly" — he  lifted  his  eye- 
brows and  his  shoulders — "possibly  I  may  be 
unwise!"  The  doubt  troubled  him  less  because 
he  had  never  been  asked  for  a  play  in  his  life. 

"I  know  something  of  the  difficulties  of  the 
profession,  naturally,"  said  Oliphant,  addressing 
himself  to  the  actress ;  "but  surely  you  have  noth- 
ing to  be  dejected  about?  You've  done  wonders." 

"Oh,"  she  sighed,  "if  you  knew  what  I've  had 
to  contend  with  in  my  career — the  obstacles  that 
would  have  crushed  an  ordinary  girl !    I  daresay 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  105 

I  shall  take  things  more  lightly  in  ten  years' 
time;  I  suppose  a  woman  does  take  them  more 
lightly  than  a  young  girl" — her  tone  suggested 
that  she  was  sixteen — "but,  do  you  know,  I 
simply  writhe  to-day  at  an  injustice!  Shall  I 
ever  forget  when  I  went  to  New  York  with  Mrs. 
Sweet-Esmond?  She  got  me  for  twelve  pounds 
a  week,  between  ourselves — I  accepted  the  offer, 
as  I  accepted  these  ridiculous  terms  at  the 
Dominion,  because  the  engagement  meant  an 
opportunity — and  then  she  simply  hated  me  be- 
cause I  rehearsed  the  part  well.  'Miss  Ellerton,' 
she  said,  'Z  have  come  to  New  York  to  make  the 
success — not  you!'  Cat!  I  think  that  tour  with 
Mrs.  Sweet-Esmond  did  more  to — to  destroy 
my  childish  trustfulness  than  anything  in  my 
career." 

He  caught  himself  wishing  that  she  would  be 
satisfied  to  call  it  her  "life"  occasionally,  but  he 
sympathised  with  her  nevertheless. 

If  her  conversation  had  been  phonographed 
and  reproduced  in  his  hearing  without  the  play 
of  her  eyes,  and  the  magic  that  her  presence 
exercised  upon  him  now,  he  would  have  judged 
it  as  fairly  as  anybody  else.  Had  he  gone  to  the 
house  as  the  friend  of  another  man  who  admired 
her,  he  would  have  judged  it  fairly  too;  and — if 
he  had  been  a  fool — he  would  have  attempted 


106  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

to  convince  the  other  man  when  they  left  that, 
apart  from  the  inexplicable  histrionic  gift,  there 
was  "nothing  in  her."  As  it  was,  the  blemishes 
which  he  could  not  overlook  were  only  spots  on 
the  sun.  They  did  distress  him  on  his  way  home, 
but  for  the  veriest  instant.  He  even  persuaded 
himself  that  they  had  a  charm,  because  they  im- 
plied a  glimpse  of  the  girl's  real  self — the  thing 
which  every  man  honestly  in  love,  every  man  not 
a  sybarite  in  the  emotions,  constantly  tempts  her 
to  expose,  instead  of  assisting  her  to  veil.  The 
man  honestly  in  love  is  the  eternal  justification 
of  the  parable  concerning  the  goose  with  the 
golden  eggs.  In  truth,  the  longer  the  girl  takes 
to  become  "real"  to  his  sight,  the  longer  his 
homage  will  last,  though  she  may  be  able  to  dis- 
play as  many  virtues  as  eyelashes;  for  nearly 
every  educated  man  is  unconsciously  an  idealist 
in  relation  to  the  opposite  sex,  and  rarely  falls 
in  love  with  a  girl  at  all,  but  with  a  character 
quite  different  which  her  face  suggests  to  him. 
That  there  are  contented  husbands  is  less  a  testi- 
monial to  men's  wisdom  than  to  women's  adapta- 
bility and  tact.  "Familiarity  breeds  contempt" 
was  a  man's  adage;  as  a  reflection  on  feminine 
character  it  is  a  lie.  Women  are  idealists  too, 
but  they  idealise  their  possessors;  men  idealise 
only  what  they  seek  to  possess.    The  longer  the 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  107 

average  woman  lives  with  a  man,  assuming  he 
is  not  a  brute — and  often  when  he  is — the  fonder 
of  him  she  becomes ;  and  on  their  silver-wedding 
she  can  kiss  his  hand  if  his  finger-nails  are  dirty. 
But  it  is  a  severe  chill  to  the  average  man's 
adoration  the  first  time  the  woman  he  worships 
has  a  cold  in  the  head.  Royce  Oliphant,  however, 
was  wooing  severer  chills. 

It  was  seven  o'clock  when  he  reached  home, 
and  Mrs.  Tubbs,  whom  he  met  on  the  stairs, 
informed  him  that  at  about  four  o'clock  a  boy 
had  brought  a  note  for  him.  Oliphant  opened 
it  hastily,  and  read  the  pencilled  message  with 
astonishment.  It  was  from  Mr.  Voysey,  and 
stated  that  Rayne  had  been  thrown  from  a  cab, 
and  rather  seriously  hurt.  Would  Oliphant  play 
"Clement"  the  following  evening?  Voysey 
would  be  at  the  Eccentric  Club  till  eleven,  and 
must  know  to-night. 

He  did  not  hesitate  a  second.  To  appear  in 
the  piece  himself  would  no  longer  imperil  its 
prospects,  and  now  he  would  be  able  to  show 
what  he  could  do  in  a  leading  part.  His  chance 
had  come.  But  this  was  not  his  paramount  con- 
sciousness as  he  caught  his  breath.  The  thought 
that  intoxicated  him  was  that  he  was  required 
to  make  passionate  love  to  Blanche  Ellerton. 

Of  course  Rayne  had  an  understudy — a  novice 


103  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

who  was  filling  a  minor  role,  and  receiving  two 
pounds  a  week;  and  of  course  the  aggrieved 
understudy  was  almost  the  only  person  in  the 
theatre  who  was  surprised  that  he  wasn't  called 
upon  to  play  the  part  now  occasion  arose.  The 
understudy  is  frequently  given  cause  for  such 
surprise.  But  to  substitute  his  unknown  name 
for  a  favourite's  if  it  can  be  avoided  would  be 
folly.  If  The  Impostor  had  been  a  success,  Oli- 
phant  would  not  have  been  thought  of  either. 
The  receipts,  however,  did  not  warrant  another 
forty  pounds  being  added  to  the  salary  list,  and 
the  actor-author  was  chosen  as  a  compromise 
between  a  man  with  a  reputation  and  the  indig- 
nant tyro  who  had  been  praying  that  Rayne 
might  be  taken  ill  ever  since  the  dress-rehearsal. 

Oliphant  left  the  Eccentric  Club  with  the  part 
in  his  pocket,  and  walked  about  among  the  blue 
rep  furniture  of  the  Burton  Crescent  drawing- 
room,  studying,  till  four  in  the  morning.  He 
really  knew  the  lines  almost  as  well  as  Rayne 
himself,  and  his  chief  anxiety  was  the  "business." 
He  was  now  painfully  alive  to  the  importance  of 
his  opportunity,  and  when  he  permitted  himself 
to  realise  that  he  was  on  the  eve  of  appearing  as 
leading  man  in  London  he  shook. 

Mr.  Voysey  had  written  to  all  the  principals 
whose  addresses  he  remembered,  and  early  next 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  109 

day  telegrams  were  despatched  to  the  rest.  At 
one  o'clock  Royce  went  through  his  scenes  with 
them — nobody  doing  more  than  murmur  the 
words — and  then  clothes  had  to  be  decided  on, 
and  a  visit  made  to  Shaftesbury  Avenue  to 
remedy  defects;  and  his  hair  had  to  be  trimmed, 
and  some  dress-ties  bought,  and  a  moustache 
selected;  and  dinner  had  to  be  swallowed — with 
the  part  propped  against  the  cruet — and  shoes 
had  to  be  varnished,  and  his  make-up  box  ex- 
amined, and  a  portmanteau  packed;  and  after 
that  he  had  to  stretch  himself  on  the  sofa  and 
try  to  sleep,  tortured  by  the  thought  that  some 
ghastly  oversight  would  paralyse  him  when  it 
was  too  late. 

When  Edmund  Kean  walked  into  Drury  Lane 
Theatre  "with  Shylock's  costume  in  a  bundle  on 
his  arm,"  he  found  it  necessary  to  dress  among 
the  supernumeraries;  when  Royce  Oliphant 
arrived  at  the  Dominion,  he  was  given  the  star 
room,  and  Rayne's  dresser,  and  all  the  appur- 
tenances of  a  position  that  he  hadn't  won.  On 
the  whole  he  thought  he  would  rather  have  been 
without  them,  though  he  appreciated  the  blessing 
of  a  room  to  himself;  he  felt  that  if  he  made  a 
failure,  he  would  look  doubly  foolish  for  the 
grandeur.  He  was  made  up  and  dressed  half 
an  hour  before  his  first  entrance,  and  lay  back 


110  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

in  an  armchair  beside  the  mirror,  listening  to  the 
vague  sounds  from  the  passages  and  stage  that 
crept  through  his  nerves.  A  first  performance 
in  a  company  that  are  already  at  home  in  their 
parts  is  a  far  greater  ordeal  to  an  actor  than  a 
first  night.  At  a  first  night  the  nervousness  is 
general,  and  the  artists  do  not  criticise  one  an- 
other; but  when  one  actor  alone  is  new  to  the 
piece,  his  nervousness  is  quadrupled  by  his  fear 
of  his  companions'  opinions. 

"Curtain's  up,  sir!"  remarked  the  dresser, 
returning  with  a  box  of  cigarettes. 

"Thank  you,"  said  Oliphant;  "how  long  have 
I  got  now?" 

"About  twelve  minutes — it's  just  on  a  quarter 
to  nine  when  Mr.  Rayne's  called.  Will  you  want 
anything  after  the  first  hact,  sir?" 

"Yes,  you  might  get  me  a  small  bottle  of 
stout.  But  for  heaven's  sake  don't  be  late  for 
my  change!" 

He  lit  a  cigarette,  and  waited  for  the  call-boy's 
summons.  .  .  . 

"  'Clement!'  Mr.  Rayne,  sir!" 

The  wings  seemed  brighter  and  hotter  than 
usual  this  evening;  the  glances  that  he  caught 
looked  anxious.  He  had  still  nearly  two  minutes. 
He  walked  round  to  the  door  in  the  canvas 
"fiat"  that  he  was  to  open,  and  stood  listening 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  111 

intently.  What  was  the  prompter  hanging  about 
for?  he  knew  what  the  cue  was  well  enough! 
"Lady  Plynlimmon's"  voice  thrilled  him — she 
ought  to  get  a  laugh  here.  .  .  .  Yes,  it  camel 
A  line  from  "Maud,"  and  it  would  be  the  instant 
for  him  to  burst  into  speech  and  enter.  "My 
God,"  he  said,  "help  me!"  The  cue  fell;  and  he 
turned  the  handle. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

A  further  contrast  to  the  Edmund  Kean 
night  was  the  fact  that  it  wasn't  "marvellous  so 
few  of  them  could  kick  up  such  a  row,"  but  the 
applause  was  hearty  notwithstanding,  and  Oli- 
phant  left  the  theatre  a  happy  man.  He  had 
succeeded ;  he  knew  it ;  and  the  cordial  congratu- 
lations of  the  company  buzzed  in  his  ears.  Natu- 
rally the  success  lacked  the  splendour  it  would 
have  had  on  the  night  of  the  production,  before 
rows  of  Press  men;  still  it  effected  a  great  deal. 
The  Stage  gave  him  a  glowing  paragraph  in  the 
next  issue;  The  Era  was  equally  generous  on 
Saturday;  and  The  Referee  sweetened  his  Sun- 
day bloater  by  its  hope  that  the  managers  would 
take  care  Mr.  Royce  Oliphant  did  not  return 
to  the  provinces  in  a  hurry — he  had  been  hidden 
there  too  long. 

These  things  mean  that  many  people  drop  into 
the  theatre  who  would  not  go  otherwise ;  though, 
as  the  majority  of  them  gain  admission  by  the 
presentation  of  their  cards,  their  attendance  is 
of  less  value  to  the  box-office  than  to  the  artist 

112 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  113 

they  come  to  see.  The  dramatic-agents,  for 
instance,  went  to  the  Dominion;  and  those  on 
whose  books  Mr.  Royce  Oliphant's  name  was 
not  registered  were  loudest  in  advising  him  to 
put  his  trust  in  them.  Two  offers  of  "leading 
business"  were  made  to  him  speedily;  but  one 
was  for  a  spring  tour,  and  the  other  was  to  sup- 
port an  actress  who  was  going  to  "star"  in 
America;  and  he  held  fast  to  his  resolution  to 
remain  in  town.  It  looked  as  if  he  should  be  able 
to  do  so  nowl  At  any  rate  he  had  obtained  a 
hearing,  and  he  had  been  very  fortunate. 

He  had,  indeed,  been  more  fortunate  than  he 
quite  realised,  for  not  only  had  the  opportunity 
not  come  too  late,  but — what  was  nearly  as  im- 
portant— it  had  not  come  too  soon.  Though  he 
had  much  to  master  still,  he  had  now  gained  the 
experience  without  which  his  talent  could  have 
made  little  or  no  impression.  He  had  conquered 
the  hardest  of  all  histrionic  tasks :  he  had  learned 
to  convey  emotion  as  well  as  to  feel  it.  Many 
other  things  he  had  had  to  learn :  things  unteach- 
able,  and  things  that  he  might  have  been  taught 
with  ease — but  which  he  had  picked  up  with  diffi- 
culty. The  actor  is  taught  nothing.  When  he 
blunders  at  rehearsal,  the  stage-manager  tells 
him  to  "do  it  the  other  way,"  and  he  obeys;  and 
in  a  different  situation  the  "other  way"  may  be 


114  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

a  clumsy  way.  If  he  is  astute  and  assiduous,  and 
an  enthusiast,  he  may,  by  acquiring  one  wrinkle 
from  the  part  he  plays  in  January,  and  another 
from  the  next,  which  he  plays  in  June,  know  very 
nearly  as  much  in  five  years  of  the  "tricks"  of 
the  stage,  as  they  are  foolishly  termed,  as  he 
could  have  been  shown  at  a  Conservatoire  in 
three  weeks.  He  has  attained  by  this  time  quali- 
ties which  no  Conservatoire  could  have  conferred, 
but  he  is  like  an  author  beginning  to  make  effects 
with  a  language  while  he  is  still  ignorant  of  its 
grammar. 

However,  Oliphant  had  profited  more  than 
most  young  men  by  the  seven  years  that  he  had 
served  for  his  Ideal,  and  such  excellent  accounts 
of  his  performance  reached  Herbert  Rayne  that 
the  invalid  suffered  a  twinge  of  professional 
jealousy.  Royce  himself  was  radiant.  Miss 
Ellerton  filled  his  thoughts — Miss  Ellerton  more 
than  ever  confused  with  her  assumption  of 
"Lady  Maud  Elstree" — and  elation  and  love 
rendered  these  days  the  most  delicious  that  he 
had  known  in  his  life. 

When  he  had  been  playing  "Clement"  rather 
more  than  a  week,  he  congratulated  her  one  eve- 
ning, during  their  first  conversation. 

"What  about?"  she  inquired,  opening  sur- 
prised blue  eyes. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  115 

"I'm  told  that  Rayne  will  be  able  to  come  back 
very  soon."  He  laughed.  "You'll  have  some- 
body to  act  up  to  you  again !" 

"M-mm!"  she  said. 

"You  know  you're  relieved  to  hear  it?" 

"Ami?" 

"Well,  aren't  you— truth?" 

"What  do  you  want  to  know  for?" 

"Because  I'm  so  conceited;  I  want  to  be 
praised." 

"Well — go  and  read  your  notices!" 

"I  could  recite  them  to  you.  Tell  me;  aren't 
you  glad  Rayne  is  coming  back?" 

"Look  out,"  she  exclaimed,  starting  forward; 
"there's  my  cue!" 

He  moved  to  the  prompt-entrance,  and 
watched  her — a  different  woman  in  an  instant, 
with  dignity  in  her  bearing  and  sorrow  in  her 
face.  Familiar  as  he  was  with  the  environment, 
he  was  momentarily  sensible  of  the  strangeness 
of  the  thing.  When  they  were  both  in  the  wings 
again — it  was  after  the  act-drop  had  fallen,  and 
she  was  hurrying  towards  her  dressing-room — 
she  flashed  a  glance  over  her  shoulder  and  threw 
him  her  answer: 

"No — I'm  sorry!"  she  said,  with  a  smile  that 
blinded  him.  He  would  have  overtaken  her, 
though  she  ran  swiftly,  but  staggering  scene- 


116  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

shifters  intervened,  and  the  walls  of  "Lady 
Plynlimmon's"  dismembered  mansion  blocked 
his  way.  Behind  the  footlights  all  was  chaos 
now,  and  there  was  his  own  change  of  costume 
to  be  made.  The  dresser  said :  "It's  a  good  'ouse 
to-night,  ain't  it,  Mr.  Holiphant?"  but  he  scarcely 
heard  the  question,  nor  the  depressed  addendum 
that  "No  doubt  a  deal  of  it  was  piper!"  He  was 
engrossed  by  the  knowledge  that  she  would  be 
"sorry,"  and  that  he  would  be  sorry — sorrier  even 
than  he  had  understood. 

But  when  he  attempted  to  tell  her  so,  she 
declined  to  be  sentimental,  and  he  returned  to 
the  dresser's  ministrations  sadly. 

There  was  a  card  stuck  in  the  looking-glass 
now,  and  he  saw  with  surprise  that  the  name 
on  it  was  Otho  Fairbairn.  At  the  back  was 
scribbled:  "I'm  in  the  stalls,  and  want  to  come 
round  afterwards." 

"Tucker,"  he  said. 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Tell  the  doorkeeper  that  when  Mr.  Fairbairn 
asks  for  me,  he  is  to  come  in,  please." 

Oliphant  was  in  his  vest  and  trousers,  remov- 
ing his  make-up,  when  Mr.  Fairbairn  was  con- 
ducted to  the  room. 

"Don't  shake  hands  with  me — I'm  all  vase- 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  117 

line,"  said  Oliphant.  "How  are  you,  old  man? 
When  did  you  come  back?" 

"My  dear  fellow,"  cried  Fairbairn,  beaming, 
"you're  perfectly  'immense'!  I  do  congratulate 
you,  upon  my  word!  I  didn't  dream  you  had 
it  in  you.  I  say,  you  are  going  it,  with  your  own 
piece,  too!  What  did  they  cut  it  up  for?  I 
think  it's  very  good.    Well,  how  are  you,  eh?" 

"I'm  all  right,"  said  Oliphant;  "awfully  glad 
to  see  you  again.  Sit  down  somewhere — Tucker, 
clear  a  chair,  will  you?  Have  you  come  from 
Paris?" 

"Yes;  I  was  going  to  Cairo,  but  I  don't  think 
I  shall.  You've  got  to  come  and  have  supper 
with  me  at  the  club ;  I  want  to  hear  all  the  news, 
don't  you  know.    Don't  say  you  aren't  free!" 

His  evident  pleasure  at  the  meeting  would 
have  been  infectious  even  if  the  sight  of  his  fair 
boyish  face  had  not  been  agreeable  to  Oliphant 
always.  He  still  looked  so  rosily,  peacefully 
young;  and  his  affectations  were  so  innocent, 
because  he  was  deceived  by  them  himself.  Per- 
haps because  he  was  conscious  of  the  weakness 
of  his  character,  he  was  perpetually  adopting  a 
new  one — for  an  hour  or  a  season.  A  year  or 
two  before,  the  Turf  had  been  the  only  thing 
worth  living  for — he  avowed  the  opinion  frankly, 
and  gloried  in  it;  but  six  months  later  he  was 


118  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

attempting  to  demonstrate  to  his  associates  the 
hollowness  of  their  pursuits  and  talking  earnestly 
of  the  responsibilities  of  wealth,  and  the  beauty 
of  a  self-sacrificing  life  in  the  East  End.  The 
phase  lasted  the  entire  autumn,  and  was  suc- 
ceeded by  an  interval  of  Schopenhauer-worship, 
in  which  he  expressed  his  preference  for  solitude, 
with  a  pipe  and  his  bookshelves,  in  such  perfervid 
terms  as  to  offend  several  of  his  dearest  friends. 
Allusions  to  the  latest  character  that  he  had  re- 
signed were  received  by  him  with  disapproval; 
and  the  still  eligible  women  whom  he  took  down 
to  dinner  once  in  six  months  were  frequently  em- 
barrassed by  their  doubt  whether  to  approach 
him  on  the  subject  of  Theosophy  or  golf. 

One  of  the  truest  sentiments  that  he  had 
uttered  sprang  to  his  girlish  lips  when  he  and 
Oliphant  had  supped,  and,  having  lighted  cigars, 
lolled  opposite  each  other  before  a  fire. 

"I  do  envy  your  having  an  aim  in  life!"  he 
exclaimed. 

"Yes ;  it's  a  very  good  thing  if  your  aim  is  true. 
It  means  a  big  disappointment  if  it  isn't,"  said 
Oliphant,  rather  startled. 

"It's  a  good  thing  anyhow,  Royce.  The  secret 
of  enjoyment  is  Endeavour  and  Purpose.  Look 
at  me — what  am  I?  I'm  miserable.  I'll  take 
my  oath  I'd  change  with  a  happy  mechanic." 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  119 

"Rot!"  said  Oliphant.  "This  is  new,  isn't  it? 
You've  always  struck  me  as  appreciating  your 
advantages  very  thoroughly." 

"What  I  want,"  said  Fairbairn,  emitting 
circlets  of  smoke  and  contemplating  them,  "is 
love,  Royce.  Believe  me,  everything  else  is  a 
bubble.  The  happiest  man  isn't  the  wealthy  man, 
or  the  famous  man,  but  the  man  who  has  the  love 
of  a  good  woman.    There's  no  blessing  so  great." 

"No,"  said  the  lover;  "no;  there  I'm  with  you." 

"Mais  cherchez  la  femme!  Oof's  a  big  draw- 
back, old  man.  I  never  get  a  woman  who  cares 
for  me;  other  chaps  do!  I  want  a  big  passion, 
Oliphant ;  I  want  a  woman  to  renounce  the  world 
or  something  for  me.  I  suppose  there  are  women 
who  renounce  things  for  fellows?  But  damned 
if  I  see  'em!  There  are  plenty  to  pretend,  if  I 
like  to  pay  for  the  amusement — some  want 
jewellery,  and  some  want  settlements — but  I 
don't  get  near  the  middle  lot  who  would  love  me 
if  I  were  a  Government  clerk." 

"Why  don't  you  read  for  the  Bar,  or  do  some- 
thing like  that?"  said  Oliphant.  "And  you  used 
to  write;  have  you  quite  given  that  up?" 

Fairbairn  nodded.  "Let's  have  a  whisky-and- 
soda!"  he  said.  "Yes;  I  get  nothing  but  disillu- 
sions. I  see  a  girl — beautiful  girl;  good  family, 
nice  figure,  not  a  point  to  find  fault  with.    Well, 


120  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

perhaps  I  think  I'd  like  to  make  that  girl  my 
wife.  But  she  wants  to  marry  me.  How  can  a 
fellow  fall  in  love  with  a  girl  who  wants  to  marry 
him?    I  was  at  the  Opera  Ball  the  night  before 

I  left " 

"You  didn't  see  her  there,  did  you?" 
"Don't  chaff,  old  man — I  feel  very  deeply  on 
the  subject;  I  do,  really.  I  say  I  was  at  the 
Opera  Ball  the  other  night,  and  I  saw  another 
girl — well,  she'd  the  face  of  a  goddess,  a  face  to 
die  for !  I  can't  tell  you  how  intensely  she  affected 
me  as  I  watched  her.  She  was  standing  alone; 
but  I  didn't  go  over  to  her,  because  I  knew  that 
to  hear  her  speak  would  be  disenchantment.  It 
struck  me  that  that  was  typical  of  everything  in 
my  life,  Oliphant!  Is  this  the  Scotch,  waiter? 
Yes,  the  Scotch  for  me.  I  wrote  some  verses 
when  I  got  back  to  the  hotel.     'Don't  take  off 

your  mask '    No!    What  is  it?    I  forget  the 

beginning.  .  .  .  One  of  them  goes  like  this — 

"Do  not  speak,  I  pray,  ma  mignonne, 
For  'Things  are  not  what  they  seem', 
And  I  know  your  voice  would  surely 
Dissipate  my  drunken  dream. 
Muse  a  moment  mutely  so,  dear, 
With  your  cheek  upon  your  hand, 
While  I  worship  what  you  are  not — 
What  you  would  not  understand!" 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  121 

"It's  very  pretty,"  said  Oliphant. 

"I  wish  I  could  remember  the  rest,"  said 
Fairbairn  more  cheerfully;  "I  think  the  sadness 

underlying  the  cynicism  is  rather Eh?    Oh, 

everything's  a  sell!  The  world's  grown  too  old 
to  be  lively — how  our  sons  will  amuse  themselves 
Heaven  alone  knows !  Paris  is  a  sell — where  are 
the  grisettes  and  the  romance  ?  When  you  expect 
the  descriptions  you've  always  received  to  be 
realised,  they  say,  'Ah,  that  used  to  be !'  It  never 
was  in  my  time,  though.  And  in  New  York, 
when  you  want  to  see  the  things  you've  heard  of 
all  your  life,  they  say,  'Ah,  that  was  once!'  It 
seems  to  me  you  and  I  were  born  too  late.  I  was 
at  Brighton  last  season — I  believe  the  most 
beautiful  women  in  Europe  were  to  be  found  at 
Brighton  during  the  season  'once.'  I  said  I 
should  like  to  see  one  or  two  of  them  this  time. 
'Ah,  people  don't  come  here  as  they  did!'  7'm 
trying  to  find  the  place  that  exists  to-day.  But 
if  I  give  Cairo  a  chance  I  know  it'll  be  a  fraud, 
and  when  I  complain  I  shall  be  told,  'Ah,  you're 
talking  of  twenty  years  ago!'  " 

"Is  that  why  you  are  here?" 

"Well,  I  should  have  seen  your  piece,  anyhow; 
I  meant  to  stay  in  town  a  night  on  purpose.  I 
say,  that  girl  who  plays  'Maud,'  Miss — what's 


122  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

her  name? — is  good-looking.  She's  a  clever 
actress,  too." 

"Miss  Ellerton,"  said  the  actor,  gazing  at  the 
fire. 

"Yes,  'Ellerton,'  that's  it!    Is  she— er " 

"She's  a  very  fine  actress  indeed,  and  a  lady; 
and — and  her  father's  a  literary  man,"  broke  in 
Oliphant  hurriedly.  "A  charming  family  alto- 
gether." 

"I  suppose  you  meet  everybody  now,  eh — all 
the  celebrities?  It  must  be  a  change  from  the 
provinces,  by  Jove!  You'll  go  to  the  top  of  the 
tree  with  a  rush,  I  expect.  Well,  you  deserve 
it!" 

"  'Go  to  the  top  with  a  rush' — what  are  you 
talking  about?  I'm  likelier  to  be  'up  a  tree'  than 
at  the  top  of  it ;  there  are  more  difficulties  in  the 
way  than  you  imagine." 

"Oh,  bosh!"  said  the  other,  with  the  easy  assur- 
ance of  the  friend  who  knows  nothing  of  the 
matter;  "you're  always  so  doubtful  of  yourself. 
You're  miles  ahead  of  half  the  best  men  in  Lon- 
don. You  don't  appear  to  be  acting,  that's  what 
fetched  me.    Why  don't  you  take  a  theatre  ?" 

"Why  don't  I  what?"  said  Oliphant,  staring. 

"Why  don't  you  take  a  theatre?"  repeated 
Fairbairn  in  the  tone  in  which  he  might  have 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  123 

said,  "Why  don't  you  take  a  cab?"  "It's  the 
thing  to  do,  isn't  it?    I'll  go  in  with  you." 

"My  dear  fellow,  do  you  regard  me  as  the 
most  conceited  man  of  your  acquaintance?  It's 
very  kind  of  you  to  suggest  such  a  thing;  but  I 
shouldn't  draw  twopence,  and  I  know  it." 

"You're  a  damned  fool,"  said  his  host  casually. 
"The  men  who  get  on  are  the  chaps  who  don't 
know  what  modesty  means.  'You  must  stir  it, 
and  stump  it,  and  blow  your  own  trumpet,  or 
trust  me  you  haven't  a  chance.'  Wouldn't  you 
like  to  have  your  own  theatre,  and  play  Hamlet? 
You  used  to  talk  enough  about  it,  I  remember. 
Bored  us  to  death !" 

"Ah,"  murmured  Royce,  "that's  another  ques- 
tion! Would  I  'like  it'?  Oh  yes,  I'd  'like  it.' 
I'd  like  to  play  Hamlet,  and  I'd  like  to  have  my 
own  theatre.  Both.  Either.  Whether  I  shall 
ever  realise  the  dream — or  half  the  dream — only 
the  good  gods  know.  Hamlet! — in  London! 
..."  He  shook  himself  and  laughed.  "Oh, 
man,  why  send  me  home  dissatisfied?  I  was 
rather  puffed  up  by  my  present  advance  when 
I  came." 

"But  I'm  perfectly  serious!"  protested  Fair- 
bairn.  "If  you'd  like  to  have  a  shot  at  a  theatre, 
I'll  go  in  with  you.  I  won't  make  you  any 
presents — you  needn't  be  afraid  of  that.    We'll 


124  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

do  it  on  commercial  lines.  We'll  find  out  the 
square  thing,  and " 

Oliphant  extended  his  hand,  with  a  flush  on  his 
face.  "You're  a  trump,  Otho!"  he  exclaimed: 
"you're  a  friend  in  a  million!  The  idea  is  pre- 
posterous, I  assure  you.  It's — it's  years  too 
soon;  one  takes  a  theatre  when  one  has  a  follow- 
ing.   But — well,  you're  a  pal!" 

He  did  not  make  his  way  towards  home  "dis- 
satisfied," nevertheless.  The  proposal,  wild  as 
it  was,  had  excited  him  temporarily;  and  with 
the  effervescence  of  fancy,  his  mood  was  gay. 
London — already  the  City  of  Recollections  to 
him — pulsed  with  promise.  Overhead  the  stars 
were  brilliant,  and  an  artificial  radiance  tinged 
the  puddles  on  the  road.  In  the  stillness  of 
Southampton  Row  his  reverie  broke  into  voice: 
"  'O,  speak  again,  bright  angel!'  "  he  cried;  and 
an  unexpected  policeman  scrutinised  him  as  he 
passed.  Heavens,  how  absurd  he  was!  But  he 
returned  to  Bloomsbury  for  a  moment  only,  and 
in  the  next  he  was  under  the  balcony  again,  where 
Blanche  Ellerton  leant  as  Juliet.  And  he  spoke 
Romeo's  lines — beyond  the  hearing  of  the  police- 
man— until  he  trembled  at  the  Burton  Crescent 
door. 

"Mr.  Rayne  will  resume  the  part  to-morrow 
evening."    There  was  no  exultance  in  his  mood 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  125 

then.  Could  he  ever  have  exulted?  The  theatre 
has  heartaches  "peculiarly  its  own" — which  was 
the  phrase  by  which  Mrs.  Ellerton  habitually 
described  the  grace  of  her  heroines.  To  see  a 
part  that  has  been  played  during  months  by  the 
woman  he  loves  represented  by  her  successor 
means  a  heartache  to  an  actor ;  and  a  bad  heart- 
ache, accentuated  by  every  familiar  line  the  new- 
comer delivers — in  such  different  tones  from  the 
voice  he  is  used  to  hear.  Often  she  wears  the 
same  frocks — which  are  eloquent  to  him  by  asso- 
ciation— and  mocks  him  with  a  poignant  resem- 
blance to  the  woman  who  is  miles  away,  or  dead, 
until  she  turns  her  face.  Perhaps  this  is  the 
worst.  It  hurts,  though,  on  the  eve  of  leaving 
the  company  himself  to  act  with  a  girl  who  is 
dear  to  him.  To-morrow  night  the  story  will 
be  played  again — she  will  be  listening  as  she  is 
listening  now;  only,  he  will  be  absent,  and  an- 
other man  will  speak  the  words  to  her  instead. 
No  child  sits  in  the  dress-circle  to  whom  the 
scenery  says  so  much  as  to  the  young  actor  who 
is  bidding  it  good-bye  at  a  time  like  this ;  he  tries 
to  impress  the  picture  on  his  brain,  that  not  a 
detail  may  be  missing  from  his  memory  of  her, 
and  feels  for  the  rooms  of  canvas  all  the  tender- 
ness with  which  one  quits  a  home. 

Certainly  Royce  would  retain  the  advantage 


126  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

of  being  the  author — he  could  still  talk  to  Miss 
Ellerton  during  her  waits,  as  he  had  done  before 
the  eventful  Monday;  but  when  he  entered  the 
Dominion  for  his  last  performance  there  he  was 
wretched. 

As  the  piece  progressed,  sentimentality  swayed 
him  wholly.  He  might  never  act  with  her  any 
more.  He  felt  as  if  he  were  falling  from  heaven 
to  a  blank.  Each  minute  was  precious,  and  he 
would  have  caught  it  and  prevented  its  escape. 
The  result  might  have  been  foretold,  though  it 
was  unpremeditated — he  confessed  in  the  love- 
scenes  all  that  he  longed  to  confess  in  the  wings ; 
and  in  the  situation  where  he  had  to  clasp  her 
to  him  in  despair,  and  swear  he  wouldn't  let  her 
go,  he  lost  control  of  himself  in  reality.  The 
approval  of  the  audience  was  ardent — there  was 
the  loudest  round  of  applause  that  had  been 
heard  in  the  house  since  The  Impostor  was  pro- 
duced. But  when  Oliphant  led  Miss  Ellerton 
before  the  curtain  and  they  made  their  bows, 
they  didn't  look  at  each  other. 

"May  I  speak  to  you?"  he  said  presently, 
when  she  came  downstairs  dressed  to  leave  the 
theatre. 

"Mr.  Oliphant?" 

"Yes,  I've  been  waiting  to  speak  to  you;  I 
can't  go  without  speaking  to  you."     Yet  for  a 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  127 

moment  he  could  find  nothing  to  say.  "You 
know,  don't  you?    Blanche,  I  love  you!" 

She  was  at  the  foot  of  the  staircase.  The  stage 
was  so  dark  now  that  her  pale  face  was  indistinct ; 
he  could  see  little  more  than  that  it  was  hers. 
"Do  you  care  for  me  at  all?  If  I  get  on,  will 
you  marry  me?"  Some  of  his  life  seemed  to 
leave  his  mouth  with  the  last  question.  He 
touched  her  hand  diffidently — there  was  a  glove 
on  it,  and  the  cold  suede  chilled  him.    "Blanche?" 

After  a  long  silence  she  said: 

"You've  surprised  me  very  much.    I Oh, 

no;  I  don't  mean  to  marry  for  years  and  years  1" 

"Why  not?"  he  asked  in  a  dreary  voice. 

"It  would  hamper  me  frightfully.  And  be- 
sides  " 

"And  besides  I'm  nothing  to  you?" 

"Oh,  you're  not  to  say  that,"  she  returned; 
"you're  a  friend;  and  I  hope  you'll  keep  one. 
Our  friendship  has  been  so  charming  and  so  in- 
teresting, hasn't  it?  It  would  be  simply  horrid 
if  we  could  never  talk  together  again  just  because 
of  this."  She  smiled.  "You  will  forget,  I'm 
sure." 

"No,"  he  said,  "I  shan't  forget.  If— if  I 
remember  long  enough — if  I  succeed — will  there 
be  a  chance  for  me  then?" 

"Oh,"  she  exclaimed,  "but  I'm  not  going  to 


128  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

marry  for  years  and  years  and  years,  I  tell  you! 
Marriage  is  a  mistake  for  a  young  girl  in  the 
profession,  unless  she  marries  somebody  very 
influential." 

"But — but  if  you  loved  me,  Blanche?" 
"Don't  let  us  talk  nonsense;  very  likely  I 
shan't  marry  at  all;  I  shall  live  and  die  an  old 
maid.  Can  you  see  me?  with  a  cap,  and  pepper- 
and-salt  ringlets !  .  .  .  We  shall  remain  friends, 
shan't  we?  I  must  say  'Good-night' — I've  my 
train  to  catch." 

"May  I  walk  to  the  station  with  you?" 
"Yes,  if  you  like.    But  you're  not  to  be  f oolish, 
mind!" 

They  passed  through  the  passage  and  turned 
into  the  Strand — which  was  henceforth  to  have 
to  him  yet  another  memory.  The  bright  decision 
of  her  tones  at  once  intensified  his  suffering,  and 
precluded  the  possibility  of  his  finding  further 
words ;  he  did  not  disobey  her  verbally.  On  the 
Temple  platform  he  closed  the  door  of  the  first- 
class  compartment  that  she  selected,  and  yearned 
at  her  with  wide  eyes  through  the  glass  till  the 
train  rushed  on.  She  was  praying  meanwhile 
that  it  would  be  quick  to  start,  for  she  held  only 
a  third-class  ticket. 

Now  she  was  gone.  The  line  was  empty;  and 
he  moved  heavily  away  into  the  street. 


CHAPTER  IX 

He  determined  not  to  go  near  the  Dominion 
for  a  week,  and  it  was  two  days  before  he  did  go. 
Then  he  denied  himself  the  stage-door  and  went 
into  the  dress-circle.  It  was  delicious  pain.  It 
is,  of  course,  desirable  to  bear  "the  pangs  of 
despised  love"  for  any  woman — "the  beautiful 
time  when  one  was  so  unhappy"  cannot,  in  fact, 
be  repeated  too  often — but  to  be  wretched  for  an 
actress  is  best  of  all;  the  emotion  is  richer  and 
more  varied  than  being  miserable  for  a  girl  in 
Society.  A  man  refused  by  a  girl  in  Society,  for 
example,  cannot  feast  his  eyes  on  her  features 
and  get  intoxicated  on  the  sweetness  of  her  voice 
for  two  hours  and  a  half  without  her  knowing  he 
is  there.  Oliphant  availed  himself  of  the  oppor- 
tunities of  his  position  for  a  fortnight  to  the 
fullest  extent. 

That  he  did  not  avail  himself  of  them  longer 
was  because  they  temporarily  ceased  to  exist. 
The  Impostor  was  withdrawn,  and  Miss  Eller- 
ton,  like  himself,  was  out  of  an  engagement.    In 

129 


130  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

her  advertisements  in  The  Era  she  called  it 
"resting." 

He  now  regretted  that  he  had  not  gone  "be- 
hind" oftener  after  the  evening  of  his  declaration. 
He  could  see  her  from  the  dress-circle  when  she 
played  another  part;  but  when  would  he  be  able 
to  stand  beside  her  in  the  wings  again?  Perhaps 
never ! 

Fortunately  there  were  other  matters  to  oc- 
cupy his  mind.  Excepting  that  enough  remained 
of  the  hundred  pounds  to  spare  him  pecuniary 
anxiety,  his  situation  really  appeared  much  the 
same  as  before  The  Impostor  was  produced. 
That  his  performance  of  "Clement"  had  borne 
good  fruit  he  knew ;  but  the  fruit  was  not  ripe — 
or  he  could  not  reach  it.  Momentarily  he  seemed 
no  better  off  than  if  there  had  not  been  any  fruit 
at  all.  The  Press  had  said  that  the  London 
managers  ought  to  snap  him  up ;  but  they  didn't. 
Nobody  displayed  the  least  eagerness  to  prevent 
his  returning  to  the  provinces ;  the  agents  talked 
about  the  provinces  as  persistently  as  ever. 
Much  better  parts,  much  better  salaries,  were 
offered  to  him,  but  always  for  tour. 

Then  at  last  he  did  obtain  an  engagement  in 
the  West  End;  and  once  more  the  criticisms  he 
received  were  excellent;  but  the  piece  had  as 
short  a  run  as  his  own,  and  he  was  not  needed 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  131 

for  the  next.  All  the  same  he  might  now  have 
remained  in  town.  He  was  not  wanted  as  a  hero, 
because  so  many  of  the  theatres  are  in  the  hands 
of  actor-managers,  who  are  their  own  heroes; 
but  he  could  have  remained  in  town,  and  earned 
ten  or  even  fifteen  pounds  a  week  before  the  year 
ended,  for  there  are  very  few  professions  better 
paid  than  the  stage  when  once  one  turns  the 
corner.    His  stumbling-block  was  love. 

It  happened  that  in  the  Green  Room  Club,  one 
afternoon,  he  met  Rayne.  Rayne  had  lost  a 
good  deal  of  money  by  Oliphant's  drama;  and 
as  "The  Great  Dominion  Success,"  he  was  hop- 
ing it  would  put  something  back  in  his  pocket 
by  means  of  an  autumn  tour.  There  were  about 
half  a  dozen  dramas  "on  the  road"  at  this  time 
described  as  "The  Great  Dominion  Success"; 
some  of  them  had  run  there  a  whole  month. 

"How  are  you?"  he  said.  "I  was  just  going 
to  drop  you  a  line  about  the  play.  I  suppose  you 
wouldn't  care  to  go  out  with  it?" 

"Oh,  no;  I  don't  want  to  go  on  tour,"  said 
Oliphant. 

"Well,  it's  for  the  autumn,  you  know;  every- 
body will  be  on  tour  in  the  autumn.  I  go  on 
tour  myself,  with  Erskine." 

"Oh,  you  don't  go  out  with  it  then?" 

"I  can't  afford  it — I  can't  afford  to  throw 


132  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

away  a  big  salary,  my  boy.  No,  I'm  sending  it 
out  with  the  cheapest  company  I  can  get  to- 
gether. It  occurred  to  me  that  it  might  be  worth 
your  while  to  play  'Clement'  for  the  sake  of  the 
piece.  The  better  it  goes,  the  better  for  you 
as  the  author." 

"Humph!"  said  Oliphant. 

"If  it  does  well,  there  are  your  fees  for  years; 
if  it  does  badly,  that's  the  end  of  it — short,  sharp, 
and  decisive.  I've  no  more  money  to  lose,  I  can 
tell  you ;  by  George,  the  Dominion  nearly  ruined 
me!" 

"The  cheapest  company  you  can  get  together?" 
said  Oliphant  ruefully.  "The  Impostor  wants 
acting;  it  won't  play  to  great  business  with  a 
cheap  crowd,  I'm  afraid." 

"It  must  take  its  chance.  I  did  all  I  could  for 
it  here,  and  then  what  was  the  business  like?  I 
haven't  got  back  the  hundred  I  put  down  on  the 
contract.  I'm  not  sure  the  wisest  course  wouldn't 
be  to  accept  the  loss  and  let  the  whole  thing  slide ; 
I'm  not  sure  of  it  by  any  means!" 

Oliphant  looked  round  the  room  without 
speaking.  It  was  Saturday  and  the  tables  were 
already  laid  for  the  house-dinner,  though  it  was 
only  three  o'clock.  A  few  actors  were  playing 
poker  near  the  small  fire-place;  a  few  others 
lounged  by  the  big  one,  puffing  cigarettes;  but 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  133 

not  many  members  were  present  yet — the  room 
would  fill  after  the  matinees  finished. 

Rayne  shifted  his  cigar  between  his  teeth,  and 
continued  with  elaborate  carelessness: 

"Of  course  'Clement'  and  'Maud'  ought  to  be 
in  good  hands — and  'Maud'  I've  got.  If  you 
had  seen  your  way  to  play  'Clement'  at  very  low 
terms,  I  think  the  tour  would  have  been  safe." 

"You've  got  'Maud'?"  asked  Oliphant. 
"What's  she  like?" 

"Oh,  Miss  Ellerton  goes  out  with  the  piece; 
I've  managed  that.    I  thought  you  knew." 

He  knew  perfectly  that  he  did  not  know;  he 
had  been  leading  up  to  the  announcement  from 
the  beginning  of  the  conversation.  That  Oli- 
phant had  been  in  love  with  Blanche  Ellerton, 
and  that  Blanche  Ellerton  might  have  been  fond 
of  Oliphant,  had  meant  a  possibility  of  obtaining 
two  good  artists  at  much  less  than  their  ordinary 
salaries.  He  had  been  on  the  stage  too  long  to 
overlook  it.  With  the  girl,  however,  he  had 
failed ;  she  did  not  reduce  her  terms  a  pound  when 
he  mentioned  that  Mr.  Oliphant — whom  he  had 
not  seen  then — had  "practically  settled  with 
him."  Oliphant,  therefore,  would  have  to  reduce 
his  tremendously!  In  his  heart,  indeed,  Rayne 
was  a  shade  sorry  for  Oliphant.  "Still,  as  Eller- 
ton was  engaged  at  her  own  figure,  it  was  only 


134  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

fair  that  some  of  it  should  be  contributed  by  her 
mash!"  That  was  how  he  put  it  afterwards  to 
the  lady  he  loved. 

"All  right,"  said  Oliphant,  'Til  go.  How 
much  do  you  want  to  pay?" 

"My  dear  boy,"  answered  Rayne,  "I'm 
ashamed  to  tell  you.    Upon  my  soul  I  am!" 

He  overcame  his  reluctance;  and  even  the 
lover  started  before  he  said  "Yes."  However, 
he  did  say  "Yes."  He  would  have  said  "Yes" 
to  thirty  shillings  a  week  in  view  of  the  induce- 
ment offered.  On  tour  with  Blanche!  He 
walked  down  Bedford  Street  intoxicated  by  the 
prospect. 

To  the  ordinary  person  there  would  seem  little 
that  is  attractive  in  a  mode  of  life  that  involves 
occupying  different  lodgings  every  six  days,  and 
undertaking  a  railway  journey  to  another  town 
every  Sunday,  and  indeed  Oliphant  had  come  to 
dislike  it  himself;  but  a  goddess  can  change  dis- 
comfort to  delight  as  easily  as  a  fairy  turns  a 
pumpkin  into  a  chariot. 

The  tour  commenced  at  Northampton  on  the 
August  Bank  Holiday.  The  evenings,  of  course, 
were  much  the  same  as  the  evenings  at  the 
Dominion;  but  now  there  was  no  need  to  wait 
until  evening  for  a  glimpse  of  Miss  Ellerton. 
Almost  every  fine  morning,  if  he  were  patient 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  135 

enough,  he  could  be  certain  of  meeting  her  in  the 
Drapery ;  and  then  what  more  natural  than  that 
he  should  accompany  her  on  her  way?  Occa- 
sionally they  forsook  the  shop-windows — the 
shop-windows  of  Northampton  are  not  the  most 
alluring — and  wandered  through  Hardingstone 
Fields,  where  there  is  nothing  to  remind  the 
pedestrian  of  shoe  manufactories  and  pork-pies, 
and  the  country  is  as  sylvan  as  if  there  were  not 
a  chimney  within  a  hundred  miles. 

From  Northampton  The  Impostor  proceeded 
to  Leicester,  but  the  name,  the  industry,  of  the 
town  they  happened  to  be  in  was  really  of  very 
slight  consequence  to  the  players.  Whether  the 
chief  thoroughfare  was  called  the  "Drapery"  or 
the  "High  Street,"  whether  the  theatre  was 
known  as  the  "Royal"  or  the  "Grand,"  their 
habits  and  the  pursuits  remained  the  same.  A 
touring  actor's  world  moves  with  him  on  Sunday. 
On  Monday  when  he  wakes  up  in  another  city, 
his  surroundings  are  to  all  intents  and  purposes 
what  they  were  in  the  last  city  the  day  before. 
The  characteristics  of  the  streets  impress  him 
very  little — he  views  so  many  new  streets — and 
the  myriad  dwellings  contain  nothing  but  stran- 
gers to  him  wherever  he  may  be.  The  population 
is  merely  the  "public,"  whose  raison  d'etre  is 
to  go  to  see  the  "show."     His  friendships,  his 


136  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

quarrels,  his  interests  are  in  the  theatrical  com- 
pany in  which  he  is  engaged. 

The  drama  did  not  attract  the  provincial  play- 
goers in  large  numbers,  but  the  author  was  not 
severely  chagrined.  So  long  as  he  could  saunter 
beside  Blanche  Ellerton  in  the  morning,  and  now 
and  again  call  upon  her  in  the  afternoon,  he  was 
able  to  pardon  the  box-office  record.  The  after- 
noon visits,  indeed,  with  tea  in  the  twilight,  were 
the  rarest  privileges  of  all,  and  by  and  by  they 
held  moments  in  which  he  was  convinced  it  wasn't 
conceited  to  feel  that  she  was  fond  of  him. 

And  he  was  right.  When  this  conviction  con- 
vulsed him  it  was  the  middle  of  October.  For 
nearly  three  months  they  had  been  constantly  in 
each  other's  society.  They  had  been  in  each 
other's  arms  on  the  stage  at  night,  and  walked 
and  talked  together  during  the  day.  When  the 
towns  afforded  opportunities,  they  had  made 
little  excursions — to  the  Castle  from  Leaming- 
ton ;  to  Jesmond  Dene  from  Newcastle-on-Tyne. 
Because  he  was  curious  about  her  Juliet,  they 
had  read  the  Balcony  Scene  together  in  her  lodg- 
ings; her  Juliet  perhaps  would  not  have  pleased 
him  quite  so  much  if  it  had  been  anybody's  else, 
but  then  her  ambition  did  not  lie  in  the  direction 
of  Shakespeare  and  blank  verse.  He  had  shown 
her  he  adored  her  in  the  most  flattering  way — 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  137 

by  endeavouring  to  conceal  it  in  obedience  to  her 
command.  She  was  a  very  practical  young 
woman ;  she  had  erected  as  many  "warnings"  for 
her  guidance  through  life  as  disfigure  Hamp- 
stead  Heath;  but,  being  a  woman  and  young,  it 
was  not  astonishing  that  her  f  eelings  should  have 
trespassed. 

She  did  not  succumb  to  the  weakness  without  a 
struggle,  and  she  mourned  the  circumstances  by 
which  the  weakness  was  caused.  She  had  always 
hoped  to  marry  an  influential  man  possessing  a 
large  income ;  influential,  because  she  did  not  wish 
to  contract  a  marriage  that  would  necessitate 
her  leaving  the  theatre,  but  longed  for  notoriety ; 
possessing  a  large  income,  because  she  loved 
luxury — more,  had  a  passion  for  it;  thirsted  to 
see  her  figure  in  silk  petticoats  and  satin  corsets, 
and  to  let  them  fall  to  the  floor  indifferently  when 
she  undressed,  since  she  had  so  many  of  them; 
wanted  to  lie  in  a  perfumed  bath,  and  have  her 
maid  bring  her  chocolate;  and  be  surprised  by  a 
friend  as  she  nestled  over  her  bedroom  fire  in  a 
wrapper  that  cost  more  than  her  best  frocks  to- 
day. It  had  been  her  aim  to  avoid  any  errors 
of  judgment  that  would  increase  her  difficulties; 
and  now  she  had  been  idiotic  enough  to  become 
fond  of  an  actor  without  reputation  or  means. 
Yes,  Blanche  Ellerton  regretted  having  signed 


138  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

for  the  tour  of  The  Impostor  very  keenly  when 
she  was  calm ;  only  she  was  not  always  calm,  and 
these  moments  in  which  she  yielded  to  sentiment 
were  as  exquisite  to  herself  as  to  the  man  she 
loved. 

Nevertheless  she  had  no  intention  of  yielding 
to  it  unreservedly,  and  she  wondered  if  it  would 
take  her  long  to  forget  him  when  they  separated ; 
if  the  nonsensical  ache  would  be  bad  to  bear. 
The  tour  was  drawing  to  a  close,  and  after  it 
finished,  of  course,  they  would  scarcely  meet. 
That  was  well!  Perhaps  he  might  come  out  to 
Earl's  Court  once  or  twice,  but  not  oftener  cer- 
tainly. Once  or  twice  couldn't  be  helped.  If 
she  had  not  asked  him  to  call  when  they  were 
at  the  Dominion,  however,  she  need  never  have 
seen  him  again  at  all.  How  stupid  she  had  been 
to  ask  him!  Still  she  had  acted  from  business 
motives;  he  had  been  very  taken  with  her,  and 
how  could  she  know  but  what  he  might  have 
another  play  produced  in  London  soon?  Yes, 
she  had  been  quite  right — that  she  would  be  a 
fool  about  him  later  was  a  thing  she  couldn't 
foresee.  She  stretched  her  arms  above  her  head 
and  yawned.    Heigho,  these  beastly  rooms ! 

Oh,  she  was  dull!  What  a  shame  it  was  that 
a  woman  like  herself  should  be  moped  in  poky 
lodgings,  and  have  to  buy  two-and-elevenpenny 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  139 

house-shoes!  And  she  had  such  pretty  feet! 
Royce  would  .  .  .  yes,  Royce  would  like  her 
feet.  .  .  .  How  ridiculously  he  thought  of  her! 
— and  she  had  really  been  quite  candid  that  night 
when  he  popped.  Perhaps  not  quite  so  candid 
since.    When  one  liked  a  man,  of  course  one  did, 

naturally,  take  a  little  pose  of Well,  one 

sympathetically  adopted  his  favourite  key.  A 
woman,  though,  would  have  known  her  for  ever 
after  that  night.  .  .  .  Men  were  very  much  nicer 

than  women.    If He  was  a  darling!    Why 

wasn't  she  a  woman  who  could  afford  to  be 
absurd?  it  would  be  lovely  to  marry  him! 
Wouldn't  it  be  lovely?  She  wasn't  j^awning 
now,  she  was  smiling.  The  street-door  bell  rang, 
and  she  quivered  with  a  hope  which  she  felt  to  be 
childish,  for  he  never  came  unless  he  was  invited. 

It  was  his  voice !  She  sprang  up,  and  dragged 
the  powder-puff  from  her  pocket,  and  pulled  at 
her  favourite  curl,  and  threw  herself  back  in  a 
graceful  position  before  he  had  wiped  his  boots. 

"Come  in,"  she  said  languidly.  Then  on  a 
note  of  surprise:  "You?" 

"Am  I  in  the  way?"  asked  Oliphant,  his  eyes 
devouring  her.  "I've  had  good  news,  and  I — I 
wanted  to  tell  you  about  it." 

"Good  news?    No;  sit  down,  do!    What  is  it?" 

"It's  an  offer." 


140  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"For  London?" 

"Yes,  more !  I  go  to  the  Pantheon.  Greatorex 
offers  me  Faust!" 

It  does  not  merit  contempt  that  her  first  emo- 
tion was  a  pang  of  jealousy;  or,  if  you  must 
be  contemptuous,  despise  human  nature  and 
not  Blanche  Ellerton.  It  was  inevitable  that 
she  should  be  envious.  For  an  actor  to  be 
chosen  from  the  provinces  to  play  "seconds"  to 
Greatorex — to  create  such  a  part  as  Faust  before 
a  first-night  audience  at  the  Pantheon — was 
almost  the  highest  conceivable  compliment.  The 
Impostor  company  had  been  shaken  to  the  core 
recently  when  the  whisper  ran  round  the  dress- 
ing-rooms that  "Greatorex  was  in  front."  They 
had  watched  him  from  the  wings,  and  acted  at 
him  from  the  stage;  they  had  all — even  to  the 
humblest  among  them — dreamed  their  dreams  in 
secret  for  a  day  or  two  and  pictured  the  opening 
of  a  note  that  would  mean  that  their  abilities 
were  recognised  at  last.  And  the  unlikely 
honour  of  an  "offer"  from  Greatorex  had  fallen 
— but  on  him;  and  she  remained  where  she  was. 

"I  am  so  glad,"  she  murmured.  "Well,  you 
are  simply  made  nowi" 

"I'm  on  the  road,  I  think,"  he  said.  "I  ought 
never  to  look  back  after  this  if  I'm  all  right  in 
the  part.     Of  course  I'm  already  quaking  with 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  141 

the  ghastly  misgiving  that  I  shan't  be  found  all 
right." 

"What  nonsense!  Besides,  it  will  be  all 
Mephistopheles,  you  may  be  sure."  She  couldn't 
help  saying  that,  and  after  it  was  uttered  she 
felt  more  generous  towards  him.  "You'll  be  a 
success,"  she  added;  "I'm  certain  of  it.  I'll  come 
and  see  you." 

"Will  you?  Not  the  first  night?  Good 
heavens,  how  nervous  I  shall  be!" 

"I  don't  suppose  I  could  get  seats  for  the  first 
night  if  I  tried.  You  may  send  me  a  couple 
if  you  like;  but  I  daresay  you  won't  be  able  to 
get  them  either.  I  say,  you  will  be  a  swell  now; 
how  you'll  look  down  on  us  poor  people  I" 

Oliphant  laughed,  with  a  reproach  on  his  face. 
"If  I'm  anxious  to  get  on,  it's  that  you  may  like 
me  better." 

"What  a  cruel  thing  to  say!"  she  replied,  smil- 
ing. "And  what  a  story,  too!  Didn't  you  want 
to  get  on  before  we  knew  each  other?" 

"Not  so  much." 

"Now  you're  making  fun  of  me — that's  un- 
kind. When  did  you  hear?  You  must  tell  me 
all  about  it!" 

She  did  not  want  to  talk  herself  yet;  she 
wanted  to  think.  She  looked  musingly  at  the 
"Weighing  of  the  Deer,"  surmounted  by  a  Japa- 


142  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

nese  fan,  between  the  windows.  The  question  in 
her  mind  was,  How  much  difference  did  this  piece 
of  luck  make?  Common-sense  answered  "None," 
firmly.  His  engagement  might  be  a  thing  of 
the  past  in  six  months,  and  have  left  him  just 
what  he  was  now,  excepting  that  for  the  rest  of 
his  life  he  would  pepper  his  conversation  with 
inapposite  remarks,  beginning,  "That  reminds 
me  of  an  experience  I  had  when  I  was  with 
Greatorex."  No,  it  could  make  no  difference 
to  anybody  who  wasn't  a  love-sick  girl  eager  to 
find  an  excuse  for  being  silly!  A  few  months' 
rapture.  And  the  price  ?  Two-and-elevenpenny 
slippers  to  the  day  she  died;  a  cheap  existence 
burdened  with  babies,  and  enlivened  by  the 
perusal  of  panegyrics  passed  on  the  women  who 
had  outstripped  her  in  the  race  1 

"Supposing,"  said  Oliphant,  "I  get  good 
notices,  and  I  remain  there  for  the  next  pro- 
duction, and  for  years?" 

"I  hope  you  will." 

"It  would  be  a  grand  engagement — one  could 
scarcely  hope  for  anything  finer." 

"You'd  have  been  very  fortunate  indeed." 

He  left  his  seat,  and  went  over  to  her  side. 

"You  said  if  you  married,  it  would  have  to  be 
a  successful  man.     Blanche,  I  am  succeeding; 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  143 

and  with  you Oh,  we  should  go  right  to  the 

top  together  1" 

She  bit  her  lip,  and  her  eyelids  fell. 

"Blanche — may  I  call  you  Blanche?" 

"Yes,"  she  said,  almost  inaudibly. 

"Blanche,  my  darling,  be  kind  to  me!  Oh, 
marry  me,  for  God's  sake — now,  to-morrow! 
Let's  risk  everything!  You  shall  never  regret 
it.    I  swear  you  shan't!    Will  you?" 

She  shook  her  head;  she  didn't  wish  to  trust 
her  voice  again  just  yet. 

"Don't  you  like  me  at  all?"  he  demanded 
impetuously.  "Not  a  little  bit?"  Her  silence 
continued,  but  her  head  was  motionless.  He 
dropped  on  to  the  stool  beside  her  armchair  and 
seized  her  hands,  and  showered  kisses  on  them 
till  she  snatched  them  away  because  they  were 
playing  her  false. 

"Oh,  be  sensible!"  she  exclaimed.  "In  a  year 
we  should  hate  each  other!" 

"I  would  worship  you!  You  don't  know  me 
if  you  think  I  could  ever  love  you  less." 

"I  know  myself.  I  wasn't  meant  for  domes- 
ticity in  the  back-parlour — I  wasn't  meant  for 
domesticity  at  all.  I'm  an  artist;  I've  my  own 
life  to  live,  my  own  ambitions  to  satisfy.  I  want 
to  be  paragraphed,  and  interviewed,  and  photo- 
graphed, and  run  after.     You  couldn't  give  me 


144  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

one  of  these  things  I  want.  I  know  it — I  know  it 
as  well  as  if  I'd  been  your  wife  ten  years.  Quite 
the  reverse!  You'd  make  everything  more  diffi- 
cult for  me — impossible  for  me!  If  you  do  get 
on,  what  then?    What  good  will  it  do  me?" 

"I'd  buy  the  world  for  you!" 

"With  good  intentions?    You  can  never  be  a 

rich  man,  my  dear  boy and  if  you  marry,  you 

will  always  be  a  poor  one.  You  may  succeed — 
I  think  you  will  succeed — but  your  success  will 
mean  a  name,  not  a  fortune.  Then  what  have 
you  to  offer  for  spoiling  my  career?  Am  I  to  be 
content  to  sit  in  the  stalls  all  my  life,  and  hear 
you  applauded?"  She  beat  the  treacherous  hands 
in  her  lap,  the  bitterer  because  she  was  fighting 
against  her  heart.  "What  can  any  ordinary  man 
offer  a  girl  who  has  a  future  without  him  ?  Mar- 
riage is  all  very  well  for  women  with  no  profes- 
sion— as  a  Home  for  the  Helpless — they  were 
nonentities  anyhow.  But  what  does  it  give  to 
a  woman  like  me  in  return  for  all  it  costs?  I 
don't  need  to  be  presented  with  shelter.  I  should 
be  a  lunatic!" 

"Plenty  of  married  women  have  been  famous 
actresses,"  urged  Royce;  "very  few  famous 
actresses  haven't  married.  And  I  may  have  a 
theatre  one  day;  I  know  a  man  who  would  help 
me. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  145 

She  had  small  faith  in  the  man. 

"Do  you  think  marriage  made  the  struggle  any 
easier  for  them?"  she  retorted. 

"Yes,  I  plo,  if  their  husbands  loved  them,  and 
could  sympathise  with  their  ideas.  Besides,  to 
be  an  artist,  a  woman  must  lovel" 

"Yes,"  she  said,  "but  to  be  a  poor  man's  wife 
she  must  be  a  fool." 

He  choked  with  mortification  and  pain. 

"You  care  nothing  about  me,  of  course,  or  you 
couldn't  argue  so." 

"No,"  she  said,  inwardly  triumphant,  "I  sup- 
pose that's  true." 

He  left,  cursing  the  vanity  by  which  he  had 
deceived  himself.  And  she  bit  a  hole  in  her 
handkerchief  and  cried. 


CHAPTER  X 

They  spoke  together  in  the  wings  briefly  that 
evening;  indeed  for  two  or  three  evenings  there 
was  restraint  between  them.  Perhaps  it  would 
have  lasted  longer,  but  on  Saturday  night  he 
happened  to  hear  that  by  a  chapter  of  accidents 
she  had  been  unable  to  arrange  for  apartments 
in  the  next  town  and  would  have  to  look  for 
some  when  she  arrived.  Even  the  worst-paid 
members  of  a  theatrical  company  engage  their 
rooms  by  letter;  for  the  trifling  reduction  in  the 
rent  that  may  be  obtained  by  a  personal  applica- 
tion does  not  compensate  for  the  dreariness  of 
tramping  from  address  to  address  after  a  long 
journey  until  a  vacant  lodging  is  found.  He 
begged  her  to  take  his.  She  refused;  and  "vow- 
ing she  would  ne'er  consent,  consented." 

As  it  was  now  Oliphant  who  had  no  rooms  and 
no  dinner  awaiting  him,  the  lady  insisted  that  he 
should  dine  with  her  and  share  the  chicken  which 
he  had  been  the  one  to  order.  The  circumstances 
precluded  formality,  and  the  estrangement  was 

146 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  147 

at  an  end.  He  was  thankful  that  it  had  been  a 
chicken.  It  might  easily  have  been  half  a  pound 
of  steak,  which  would  have  been  awkward. 

Still  he  was  resolved  never  to  revert  to  the 
subject  of  his  love  for  her  again;  and  he  kept  his 
resolution  so  well  that  she  grew  hungry  for  the 
music  of  the  tale  tabooed.  Perhaps  that  was 
why  she  did  not  hesitate  when  he  suggested  an- 
other excursion.  It  may  not  have  been  so,  but 
even  if  it  was,  her  inconsistency  was  equalled  by 
his  own,  for  this  excursion  that  he  meditated  was 
a  veritable  sentimental  journey,  aggravated  by 
the  proposed  companionship. 

A  few  miles  distant  lay  a  country  town  which 
was  intimately  associated  with  his  boyhood.  He 
had  gone  there  with  his  father  seventeen  years 
ago,  and  never  seen  it  since.  He  had  scarcely 
seen  it,  in  fact,  when  he  bade  it  good-bye,  for 
he  had  bidden  good-bye  to  his  first  sweetheart 
at  the  same  time,  and  been  blind  with  tears.  The 
maiden  had  been  twelve,  and  he  a  stout  thirteen. 
During  a  long  heartache  he  had  made  abortive 
efforts  to  paint  the  scene  of  this  early  romance 
in  water-colours  on  cartridge  paper.  He  failed, 
not  because  his  memory  of  the  spot  had  weak- 
ened, but  because  he  had  never  painted  anything 
hitherto  excepting  a  dog  kennel.  The  best  pic- 
ture was   the  intangible   one   that   disappeared 


148  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

when  he  woke;  for  he  dreamed  of  arriving  at 
the  little  station,  and  surprising  Mary  Page  in 
the  orchard — her  name  was  Mary  Page — vividly 
and  often;  and  he  could  never  eat  his  breakfast 
on  the  morning  after  the  dream  occurred,  so  sick 
was  he  with  the  longings  of  his  little  soul,  the 
craving  for  the  sight  of  Mary  Page's  plaits.  He 
now  found  himself  as  a  man  in  the  vicinity  of 
the  place  for  which  he  had  yearned  so  desperately 
as  a  child,  and  he  wanted  to  look  at  it  again  with 
Blanche  Ellerton  by  his  side. 

They  had  an  hour's  journey,  for  the  train 
travelled  with  intense  deliberation,  and  stopped 
at  every  opportunity.  At  last,  however,  they 
arrived,  and  Royce,  who  discovered  that  the 
hallowed  station  had  been  enlarged,  inquired  the 
way  to  some  wooden  steps. 

"There  are  some  wooden  steps  leading  to  a 
road  with  a  hedge  on  each  side,  aren't  there?" 
he  asked. 

He  was  told  there  were  not,  and  was  discon- 
certed. 

"If  there  aren't,"  he  said  to  Miss  Ellerton, 
"I'm  afraid  it's  a  failure.  There  were  two  houses 
in  a  private  lane,  but  I  don't  know  what  the  lane 
was  called — I  don't  think  it  was  called  anything. 
The  houses  were  Mowbray  Lodge  and  Rose 
Villa.    I  lived  at  Mowbray  Lodge.    I  could  walk 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  149 

there  blindfolded  from  the  top  of  those  steps. 
They  should  be  just  here — I've  stood  on  them 
a  thousand  times,  and  watched  the  sails  of  a 
windmill  go  round." 

"Did  your  First  Love  lean  there  with  you?" 
asked  the  actress;  "it  sounds  like  it." 

"No,  I  don't  remember  her  there;  she  was 
always  in  the  orchard  opposite  the  two  houses." 

"Eating  green  apples  I" 

"They  were  ripe — and  the  best  apples  I've 
ever  tasted.  Here's  somebody  else!  There  are," 
he  repeated,  "some  wooden  steps  close  by,  lead- 
ing to  a  road  with  a  hedge  on  each  side,  aren't 
there?" 

"Lord  love  yer,"  answered  the  native,  "there 
ain't  been  no  steps  'ere  this  ten  year!"  He 
seemed  to  think  the  question  very  foolish,  and 
continued  his  way. 

"Rip  Van  Winkle,  the  steps  have  vanished," 
said  Miss  Ellerton.    "What  next?" 

Royce  pondered,  and  looked  about  him. 

"Well,  the  road  can't  be  gone,  at  any  rate," 
he  said.  "Perhaps  it's  at  the  top  of  this  slope? 
I  didn't  notice  we  were  on  a  slope,  did  you? 
Shall  we  try?" 

She  thought  it  a  good  idea;  and  the  road  was 
there. 

"Ha,"  cried  the  young  man  radiantly,  "how 


150  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

it  all  comes  back  to  me!  I  hear  my  own  moun- 
tain-goats bleating  aloft,  and  know  the  sweet 
strain  that  the  corn-reapers  sing.  But  I'm  sorry 
they've  taken  away  those  steps!  We  go  over 
the  bridge,  and  the  lane  is  on  the  right.  Isn't  it 
pretty?    I  wish  we'd  come  in  summer,  though!" 

"It's  very  pretty  now,"  she  said. 

The  entrance  to  the  lane  occurred  unexpect- 
edly, at  least  to  her ;  the  low  wall  above  which  the 
trees  waved  made  a  quick  curve,  and  was  lost 
in  a  laurel-bush.  Oliphant  urged  her  forward 
joyously,  and  then  they  were  on  the  other  side 
of  the  wall,  and  opposite  a  gate  which  divided 
them  from  a  weed-grown  carriage-drive.  He 
said:  "Mowbray  Lodge!"  And  when  he  lifted 
the  growth  of  encroaching  creeper,  the  name  was 
indeed  visible — which  was  to  him  like  a  kiss  from 
the  past.  After  a  minute  they  came  to  another 
house,  also  lying  back  from  the  lane  behind  a  gate 
and  carriage-drive;  and  this  time  he  said  "Rose 
Villa!" 

"Are  you  satisfied?"  she  smiled. 

"I  am  sad,"  he  declared  quite  truthfully, 
though  a  moment  before  he  had  been  delighted. 
"Do  you  see  that  fence?  It  separates  the  Mow- 
bray Lodge  and  Rose  Villa  gardens.  It  was 
across  that  fence  I  first  saw  her.  Come,  I'll  show 
you  the  orchard  that  I  used  to  try  to  paint.    But 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  151 

— oh,  this  is  quite  different!  None  of  that  glass 
was  there ;  it  was  all  open — it  had  nothing,  noth- 
ing at  all,  except  the  apple-trees  and  two  chil- 
dren. Look,  there's  a  man  in  his  shirt-sleeves, 
digging.    Let's  go  over  to  him  1" 

The  ground  had  been  acquired  by  Mr.  'Obbs, 
the  florist  in  the  'Igh  Street,  they  learnt;  and 
both  the  houses  were  to  let.  "Page"?  Yes,  the 
man  remembered  the  name  of  Page.  The  father 
had  been  a  doctor,  hadn't  he?  They  had  been 
gone — oh,  a  matter  of  nine  years. 

"I  believe  you're  sorry  you  came,"  said  Miss 
Ellerton  gaily.  "Did  you  expect  to  find  Mary 
waiting  for  you?" 

"It  would  have  been  romantic  to  find  her  living 
here  still,  wouldn't  it?  Though,  of  course,  she 
wouldn't  have  known  me.  But  I  don't  think  it's 
Mary  I'm  melancholy  about  so  much  as " 

"As  what?" 

He  sighed.  "I  don't  know — it's  so  pathetic  to 
be  'grown  up.'  " 

She  accepted  it  as  a  jest,  and  laughed;  but 
he  had  spoken  quite  seriously.  Thoughts  of  his 
childhood  crowded  on  him.  His  father  used  to 
stroll  along  this  lane  in  the  sunset,  with  a  pipe 
between  his  lips.  There  was  no  sunset  now,  and 
the  lips  were  cold,  but  the  dead  day  lived  again 
to  Oliphant.     His  sweetheart,  Mary  with  the 


152  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

golden  plaits,  must  be — how  old?  Nine-and- 
twenty!  He  realised  it  with  a  shock.  If  it  had 
been  nineteen!  But  nine  and  twenty!  There 
was  tragedy  in  the  difference  between  such  an  age 
and  twelve.  And  the  boy  he  recalled  so  tenderly, 
where  was  he?  Gone  too.  He  would  have  loved 
to  commune  with  him,  as  the  boy  had  always 
looked  forward  to  his  doing.  How  beautiful  a 
comrade!  But  life  was  so  large,  and  the  boy 
had  been  lost,  somewhere  among  the  years,  and 
was  only  a  memory. 

"At  this  point,"  said  Miss  Ellerton,  "an  ex- 
traordinary thing  happens!  You  see  the  figure 
of  a  young  and  lovely  woman  in  a  contemplative 
attitude.  And  she  is  Mary  Page  revisiting  her 
old  home.  It  would  act  well.  Could  you  play 
the  scene?" 

"The  heroine  would  speak  first,"  said  Royce, 
rousing  himself.    "What  would  she  say?" 

"Oh,  she  begins  with  a  question.  She  says: 
'Excuse  me,  but  can  you  tell  me  if  there  is  a 
caretaker  here? — I  see  the  house  is  to  let.'  " 

'  'I  am  a  stranger,'  "  answered  Oliphant;  "I 
am  sorry  I  don't  know.'  " 

"  'I  saw  you  coming  from  the  garden.  I 
fancied  perhaps '  " 

"  'I've  been  guilty  of  trespassing.  I  knew  that 
garden  well  once ;  I  couldn't  pass  it  by.' ' 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  153 

"'You  knew  it?    You?'" 

"  'Dr.  Page  lived  here  in  the  days  I  speak  of.'  " 

"  'Dr.  Page  was  my  father's  name.'  " 

"  'Your  father?  Mary!  Oh,  forgive  me  1  But 
— am  I  quite  forgotten?'  " 

"  'You — are — Royce — Oliphant?  Oh,  this  is 
wonderful  indeed  I'  " 

They  looked  in  each  other's  eyes  and  laughed 
together.  Then  a  shadow  crossed  the  girl's  face, 
and  she  said  half  playfully,  half  in  earnest : 

"I  do  believe  that's  just  what  you'd  really 
like!" 

"What  is?" 

"To  see  Mary  here  and  make  love  to  her.  But 
I  daresay  she's  fat  and  ugly,  and  you'd  be  dis- 
appointed." 

"She  had  a  beautiful  nature,"  said  Oliphant. 
"I  hope  that  hasn't  got  ugly." 

"A  'beautiful  nature' — a  brat  of  twelve! 
What  did  she  do — always  give  you  the  lemon- 
peel  off  her  cake?  I  should  look  for  her  and 
marry  her  if  I  were  you." 

"I  expect  she  married  long  ago.  Why  have 
you  turned  cross  all  of  a  sudden?" 

"Cross?"  she  echoed  with  amazement.  "I'm 
not  in  the  least  cross.  .  .  .  Only  this  is  rather 
dull,  you  know,  standing  about  a  wet  lane  and 
pretending  to  be  somebody  else." 


154.  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"Why,"  he  cried,  paling,  "it  was  you  who  sug- 
gested that!     If  I'd  guessed  it  bored  you 

Let's  go !    I'm  ever  so  sorry." 

"I  don't  want  to  go;  I'm  tired.  I  want,"  she 
said  imperiously,  "to  sit  down  on  that  bench,  and 
have  some  buns  and  lemonade." 

"Won't  you  come  and  have  some  tea?" 

"No,  thank  you,"  she  said.  .  .  .  "Well,  shall 
we  go  home?" 

"Will  you  stay  here  half  an  hour  alone?" 

"What  for?" 

"As  well  as  I  remember  there  isn't  a  shop 
anywhere  near;  but  if  you  don't  mind  waiting, 
I'll  race  into  the  town." 

"Very  well,"  she  assented.    "I'll  wait  for  you." 

Although  the  task  that  she  had  set  him  was  a 
troublesome  one  to  fulfil,  and  though  she  looked 
triumphant  when  he  returned  in  a  heat  to  min- 
ister to  her  requirements,  she  ate  only  a  fragment 
of  bun,  and  sipped  but  little  of  the  lemonade. 
This  puzzled  him  very  much.  He  decided,  at 
last,  that  she  must  have  grown  faint  during  the 
delay;  and  he  said  so.  And  then  she  seemed  to 
smile  involuntarily,  which  puzzled  him  more. 
However,  her  amiability  was  restored. 

Presently  she  said  in  a  careless  tone : 

"What  do  you  call  a  'beautiful  nature'?  I 
mean  in  a  woman?" 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  155 

"I  don't  follow  you." 

"You  used  the  expression  about  something. 
Oh  yes !  You  said  that  that  child  had  a  beautiful 
nature,  that  was  it!" 

"Well,  it's  rather  difficult  to  define,"  replied 
Oliphant. 

"You  mean  'unpractical,'  I  suppose?" 

"Say  'unworldly.'  " 

"It's  the  same  thing — let's  keep  to  'unpracti- 
cal'! Why — why  should  men  look  down  on  a 
woman  for  being  practical?  They  don't  look 
down  on  one  another,  do  they?" 

"I  don't  think  it's  true  that  they  do  look  down 
on  her." 

"Yes,  it  is,"  she  said;  "they  want  women  to 
be  fools." 

"Only  men  who  are  fools  themselves." 

"Do  you  think  you're  a  fool?" 

"I  don't  want  women  to  be  fools." 

"But  you  despise  a  girl  for  being  sensible." 

"I  don't  know  what  you  mean."  He  was  be- 
ginning to  be  troubled. 

"You  do,"  she  said  with  a  catch  in  her  voice. 
"You  despise  me!" 

The  gardener  in  his  shirt-sleeves  had  disap- 
peared. Where  they  sat,  Oliphant  could  see 
nothing  but  the  trees  and  her  distress.    Emotion 


156  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

for  an  instant  held  him  dumb ;  but  it  was  for  an 
instant  only. 

Then  it  was  she  who  was  troubled  by  the  blaze 
she  had  made,  though  warmed  at  the  same  time 
by  the  ardour  of  it. 

"No,  no,"  she  said,  "I  told  you  it  was  impos- 
sible." 

"But  you  shall — you  shall!  I  won't  let  you 
go  till  you  say  'Yes.'  " 

"You  are  mad  to  want  me.  I'm  a  piece  of 
stone." 

"I'd  kiss  you  into  life  if  you  were!" 

"I'm  not  good  enough  for  you.  Oh,  believe, 
believe  I'm  not!" 

"My  God,  there's  nobody  on  earth  like  you! 
Tell  me  you  love  me." 

"I  don't!" 

"You  do !  and  you  shall  say  it.    Tell  me !" 

"No." 

"Tell  me  you  love  me!" 

"I'm  stronger  than  you  think — I  won't!" 

He  began  to  fear  that  she  never  would;  and 
indeed  she  did  not  say  it.  But  the  next  second 
her  face  turned  whiter,  and  she  flung  her  arms 
round  his  neck.  And  after  all  they  were  engaged. 


CHAPTER  XI 

And  the  moment  when  she  first  regretted  it 
was  seven  hours  later,  after  the  candle  was  out, 
when  she  lay  thinking.  But  the  next  morning, 
when  she  was  in  his  arms,  she  was  reckless  again 
and  happy. 

They  did  not  love  each  other,  but  both  were 
violently  in  love,  and  thought  they  did.  But 
the  woman's  self-knowledge  was  at  least  greater 
than  the  man's,  and  she  knew  that  there  could 
never  be  any  person  in  the  world  whom  she  loved 
quite  so  dearly  as  herself.  Therefore  she  was 
exigent  and  imperious,  and  if  he  had  been  less 
infatuated,  would  have  appeared  unreasonable 
in  the  demands  she  made  upon  his  time;  for  she 
wished  to  stifle  the  knowledge  and  the  voice  of 
wisdom,  and  when  he  was  with  her  she  succeeded. 

As  he  asked  no  better  than  to  be  with  her  all 
day  long,  it  was  only  when  the  candle  was  out 
that  the  voice  of  wisdom  had  a  listener. 

And  then  she  argued  with  it,  and  said  that  it 
was  maligning  her,  and  that  she  was  a  much  nicer 

157 


158  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

girl  than  it  knew.  It  was  a  fact  that  she  was 
forsaking  her  faith,  but  since  it  had  been  a  false 
faith  she  was  acting  wisely  to  desert  it.  She  was 
converted ! 

Of  course  at  home  they  wouldn't  rejoice!  She 
hesitated  to  write  the  news;  and  then  decided  to 
write  it  quickly,  so  that  they  might  have  time  to 
accustom  themselves  to  the  idea  before  she  saw 
them.  It  would  mean  more  novelettes,  or  in- 
creased economy;  she  wasn't  going  to  continue 
to  help  them  after  she  was  married — it  wouldn't 
be  fair  to  Royce.  A  woman's  first  duty  was  to 
her  husband.  Besides,  it  would  be  horrid  to 
have  to  admit  to  him  that  her  people  were  in 
such  straitened  circumstances.  No ;  Royce,  poor 
boy,  was  burdening  his  back  to  win  her — every 
shilling  that  she  earned  belonged  to  him!  .  .  . 
Mother — who  would  feel  the  difference  most — 
would  behave  best  about  it.  Father  would 
advise  her  to  take  years  to  make  up  her  mind, 
and  be  doubly  disagreeable  to  mother.  Ger- 
trude? Gertrude  would  be  jealous  of  her  as 
usual.  On  the  whole  the  house  would  be  none 
too  pleasant  during  her  engagement;  she  was 
sorry  she  had  to  return  to  it.  .  .  .  How  Royce, 
though,  would  loathe  taking  her  salary,  the  dear ! 
And  going  to  the  Pantheon  as  he  was,  he  could 
certainly  do  without  it — at  all  events  if  she  didn't 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  159 

have  a  baby.  Probably  he  would  refuse  to  touch 
a  penny  of  it  and  tell  her  to  keep  it  for  pocket- 
money.  Really  their  life  would  be  quite  charm- 
ing!    With  nothing  to  do  with  her  salary  but 

buy  frocks  and  hats And  then  Royce  would 

want  to  give  her  frocks  and  hats  as  well!  Oh, 
she  was  glad,  glad  she  was  being  brave,  and 
marrying  for  love — God  had  been  very  good  to 
her! 

The  Impostor  company  disbanded  at  St.  Pan- 
eras  a  few  Sundays  later.  Sunday  was  addition- 
ally tedious  to  her  and  Oliphant  now,  for — the 
men  and  women  being  divided  when  they 
travelled — this  was  the  day  on  which  they  saw 
least  of  each  other.  When  St.  Pancras  was 
gained,  the  lovers  had  not  spoken  together  for 
more  than  two  minutes  during  three  hours.  Oli- 
phant hurried  to  her  compartment  at  once. 
There  were  general  handshakes  amid  the  clamour 
for  cabs.  Many  of  the  company  who  had  become 
staunch  friends  would  not  meet  again  for  years, 
as  has  been  said  before,  and  names  and  faces 
alike  would  be  forgotten ;  but  this  afternoon  they 
were  still  comrades,  and  the  men  exclaimed:  "Ta, 
ta,  dear  boy!  I  suppose  you  turn  up  in  the 
Strand?"  and  the  women  kissed  one  another 
affectionately,  and  repeated,  "Now,  mind  you 
write!" 


160  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

Royce  and  the  girl  stood  on  the  platform  con- 
ferring. It  had  been  arranged  that  he  should 
not  go  out  to  Earl's  Court  before  the  morrow; 
but  all  at  once  both  felt  the  manner  of  their 
parting  to  be  melancholy,  and  he  begged  that 
instead  of  their  separating  at  the  station,  she 
would  at  least  let  him  drive  some  of  the  way  with 
her.  She  said  "yes"  readily  enough,  so  he  had 
his  own  luggage  deposited  in  the  cloak-room,  and 
got  into  her  hansom. 

Needless  to  say,  she  had  made  use  of  her 
powder-puff  before  the  train  stopped;  and  she 
was  one  of  the  women  who  knew  how  to  tie  a 
veil.  She  put  on  her  gloves  well,  too.  She  could 
not  help  their  quality,  but  she  didn't  commit  the 
infamy  of  buying  them  tight,  and  skipping  the 
first  button.  Women's  hands  were  meant  to  be 
squeezed,  but  she  knew  they  were  not  meant  to 
be  squeezed  into  gloves.  Oliphant  took  Blanche 
Ellerton's  hand,  and  thought  what  a  wonderful 
thing  it  was  to  be  a  woman.  There  was  no  power 
like  it!  What  a  delicate  little  nose  she  had;  and 
how  tempting  her  lips  were  under  the  net  I 

"Darling!"  he  said;  "put  your  veil  up." 

"Oh,  I  can't!    People  would  see  us." 

"The  street's  empty;  look!" 

So  for  ten  seconds  she  put  up  her  veil. 

"I've  been  miserable  all  the  journey,"  he  said. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  161 

She  confessed  coquettishly  that  she  also  had 
found  it  dull;  and  after  he  had  rhapsodised: 

"I  wish  this  fellow  wouldn't  drive  so  fast!" 
he  exclaimed;  "I  don't  know  how  I  shall  get 
through  this  evening.  Youll  have  your  people; 
but  I  shall  have  nothing — only  your  likenesses." 

"  'Only'  indeed!  Give  'em  back  to  me  if  you 
don't  appreciate  them." 

"Oh,  you  know  what  I  mean!" 

"Do  I?" 

"I  shall  spend  the  time  writing  you  a  letter." 

"Silly  Billy!    You  won't?    Not  really?" 

"I  believe  I  shall!  Blanche,  you're  quite  sure 
they  won't  make  obstacles  to-morrow  when  I 
come?  You  won't  keep  me  waiting  a  year  for 
you?" 

"Is  a  year  long?"  she  murmured,  gleaming 
with  mischief. 

"Oh,"  he  cried,  "a  year!  It's  going  to  be  soon, 
isn't  it?" 

"Well,  we'll  see  how  good  you  are!  Why  are 
you  in  such  a  hurry?" 

"Because  I  love  you!  love  you!  love  you!  .  .  . 
Have  I  torn  it? — oh,  I'm  so  sorry !  Why  did  you 
pull  it  down  again?  .  .  .  Blanche!" 

"M-m?" 

"Where  shall  we  live?" 


162  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"My  dear !"  she  laughed.  "This  is  very  previa 
ous!" 

"No,  it  isn't;  what  have  we  to  wait  for?  We 
could  take  a  little  house  somewhere  to-morrow; 
we  could  furnish  it  on  the  hire-system.  And  we 
can  save  a  heap  out  of  my  salary.  Even  if  I  left 
the  Pantheon  after  Faust  we  should  have  plenty 
to  live  on  till  I  got  something  else." 

"Yes,"  she  said;  "we  shouldn't  starve,  I  know. 
Don't  forget  there's  my  salary  as  well." 

"Yours?"  he  exclaimed;  "yes,  there's  yours, 
of  course ;  but  I  don't  want  you  to  buy  your  own 
bread-and-butter,  sweetheart.  It  isn't  as  if  I 
were  still  getting  five  pounds  a  week  and  we 
couldn't  marry  unless  we  clubbed  together." 

"Don't  be  so  ridiculous,"  she  answered,  warm 
with  happiness ;  "what  do  you  suppose  I'm  going 
to  do  with  the  money  then?  You'll  tell  me  next 
you  want  me  to  leave  the  profession!" 

"I  won't  do  that — because  I  know  how 
wretched  you'd  be.  But  there's  one  thing  I 
want ;  I  want  you  to  remain  in  town.  You  won't 
go  on  tour  if  I'm  in  London,  Blanche?" 

She  hesitated.  "Not  from  choice,  naturally. 
I  should  like  London  shops  myself." 

"But  I  mean  assuming  you  can't  get  one,  and 
you  are  offered  a  tour;  you  wouldn't  accept  it?" 

"But  if  I  didn't,  I  might  be  out  for  a  year  at 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  163 

a  stretch ;  to  all  intents  and  purposes  I  should  be 
leaving  the  profession." 

"Oh,  nonsense!"  he  said  cheerfully;  "if  I  can 
stop  in  town,  you  can  certainly!  It's  easier  for 
a  girl  to  get  on  than  for  a  man." 

"They  say  it  is,  as  a  rule.  But  there  are 
exceptions  to  every  rule,  aren't  there?" 

"The  proper  thing  would  be  joint  engage- 
ments." 

"Yes,  that  would  be  simply  charming,"  she 
said.  "Do  you  think  you  could  get  me  into  the 
Pantheon?  Oh,  Royce,  wouldn't  it  be  simply 
sweet  if  you  could  get  me  into  the  Pantheon!" 

"I'll  try,  you  may  be  sure;  but,  of  course,  it's 
a  difficult  theatre  for  a  woman — I  don't  quite 
know  what  you  could  do  at  the  Pantheon.  Still 
I  shan't  be  there  for  ever;  we'll  go  to  a  house 
where  you  can  be  lead — although  as  I  shan't 
be  lead,  that  won't  be  unalloyed  bliss  either.  I 
don't  want  to  see  another  fellow  making  love  to 
you  in  every  part  you  play!" 

"As  if  it  mattered!"  she  said  scornfully.  "I 
shouldn't  know  he  was  there." 

"Wouldn't  you?  /should!  It  sounds  a  selfish 
sentiment,  Blanche,  but  upon  my  soul  I  almost 
begin  to  wish  you  hadn't  been  an  actress  at  all." 

"How  abominable!    Oh!"    She  turned  aston- 


164  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

ished  eyes.  "What  a  perfectly  philistine  thing 
to  say!" 

"Yes,  I  know,"  returned  Oliphant  with  a  help- 
less smile;  "I  know  it's  very  philistine — that's 
exactly  what  I  thought  you'd  call  it.  But  I 
worship  the  ground  you  walk  on,  and  the  hat 
that's  been  on  your  head,  and — and  that  veil 
I've  torn  on  your  face.  My  dear,  you  don't 
know  what  you  are  to  me.  I  shall  be  green  with 
jealousy  every  time  the  hero  puts  his  arm  around 
your  waist." 

She  drooped  a  little,  so  that  her  shoulder 
thrilled  him. 

"And  what  about  me,"  she  said,  "when  you 
make  love  to  the  ingenue?" 

"Oh,  Blanche,  you  know  that's  quite  different!" 

"Is  it— why?" 

He  could  not  explain  precisely  why ;  so  he  held 
her  hand  again  behind  the  apron  of  the  cab.  At 
last  he  said : 

"Well,  when  we  have  that  theatre  of  our  own, 
'all  will  be  gas  and  gaiters' !" 

"Ah!"  she  said;  "and  drive  home  together  to 
Cadogan  Square  or  somewhere  in  our  brough- 
am!" 

"Can  you  see  it — you  and  me  in  management?" 

She  had  seen  it.  She  saw  Cadogan  Square  and 
a  brougham. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  165 

"Not  Shakespeare  all  the  time,  dearest  boy," 
she  said,  "eh?" 

"No,  not  Shakespeare  all  the  time — rather  not; 
very  little  Shakespeare.  But  I  think  you  and 
I  would  do  good  work  together  for  all  that; 
shouldn't  we?  We  shall  have  it — I  shall  get  on! 
All  I  needed  was  to  meet  you — to  encourage  me, 
and  keep  me  up  to  the  mark.  If  I'm  ever 
tempted  to  sink  the  artist,  refuse  to  live  with  me, 
and  say  I  won  you  by  false  pretences.  No,  seri- 
ously, you'll  be  the  making  of  me.  A  man  by 
himself  is  apt  to  get  his  ideals  blunted — the 
world's  hard,  and  it  takes  the  edge  off  them;  but 
a  girl  like  you  would  keep  a  fellow  an  artist  to 
the  end  of  time." 

She  could  never  quite  understand  what  his 
ideals  were,  though  she  had  often  listened  to  him 
on  the  subject.  Now,  however,  when  he  said  that 
a  girl  like  herself  was  such  a  boon  and  a  blessing 
his  meaning  seemed  momentarily  clearer.  She 
gave  a  sigh  of  response,  and  felt  holy. 

It  is  an  error  to  suppose  that  Earl's  Court 
is  never  adjacent  to  St.  Pancras.  They  had 
stopped  at  the  corner  of  the  street.  Having 
ascertained  that  the  trap  in  the  roof  was  down, 
Oliphant  said  good-bye  to  her,  and  then  got  out, 
and  was  astonished  that  so  very  short  a  drive 
could  be  more  than  a  shilling  fare.     She  waved 


166  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

her  hand  to  him  a  second  time,  and  the  pleasure 
within  her  had  scarcely  faded  when  she  saw  her 
home. 

Mrs.  Ellerton,  who  had  been  watching  for  her 
arrival,  behind  the  spiraea  in  the  window,  ran 
to  the  door  herself,  and  kissed  her  in  the  passage 
almost  as  warmly  as  she  desired  to  do.  She  had 
not  for  years  kissed  her  quite  so  warmly  as  she 
desired  to  do ;  the  girl  confessed  that  she  was  not 
demonstrative,  and  since  the  summer  when  she 
put  her  hair  up,  her  mother  had  always  been  a 
little  afraid  of  a  repulse. 

Blanche  followed  her  into  the  drawing-room. 
As  it  was  Sunday,  and  there  might  possibly  be 
callers,  a  fire  had  been  lighted  there. 

"Tea  will  be  ready  directly,"  said  Mrs.  Eller- 
ton; "I  told  Flora  not  to  make  it  till  you  came. 
Are  you  tired?  Well,  dear,  I'm  very  pleased — 
what  I  wrote  you  is  quite  true,  I'm  very,  very 
pleased.  I  wish  we'd  seen  more  of  him;  but,  of 
course,  all  that's  to  come.  When  you're  rested, 
you  must  tell  us  everything." 

"Where  are  the  others?"  asked  her  daughter, 
unpinning  her  hat,  and  plucking  at  her  hair. 
"What  does  father  say  about  it?" 

"Well,  dear,"  said  Mrs.  Ellerton  evasively,  "of 
course  we  shall  have  to  manage  a  little  better, 
shan't  we  ?    And  it's  only  proper  that  we  should ! 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  167 

You'll  have  your  own  home  to  think  of,  and  we 
can't  expect  things  to  be  quite  the  same.  But 
we  couldn't  hope  to  keep  you  with  us  always;  it 
was  only  to  be  supposed  that  this  would  happen 
some  day.  And  I  do,  do  hope  you've  chosen 
well,  Blanche,  and  that  he'll  make  you  very 
happy !"  She  half  opened  her  arms,  but  the  girl 
was  still  arranging  her  hair  in  the  looking-glass 
and  did  not  seem  to  see. 

The  novelist  and  Gertrude  joined  them  now, 
followed  by  the  general  servant  with  the  teapot. 

"I  think  I'll  go  upstairs  and  get  my  boots  off," 
said  Blanche  after  the  greetings.  "Can  Flora 
take  up  my  basket?    Gertie,  you  might  help  her." 

"That's  a  new  coat,"  observed  Gertrude,  re- 
garding her  enviously;  "you're  always  buying 
new  things!  I  can't  help  her  with  that  great 
basket — I've  been  ill  again.  Why  didn't  you  ask 
the  cabman?" 

"Leave  it  till  to-morrow,  dear,"  said  her 
mother;  "one  of  the  tradesmen  will  carry  it  up 
in  the  morning.  You  can  take  out  what  you 
want  for  to-night;  I'll  come  and  help  you  pres- 
ently." 

"I'll  get  my  boots  off  at  once;  I  shan't  be  a 
minute.  Is  that  toast?  Don't  let  Gertie  eat  it 
all  before  I  come  back — I'm  hungry." 

"How    unromantic!"     said    Gertrude;     "we 


168  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

thought  perhaps  you'd  eat  less  now  you're  in 
love.  And  my  frocks  are  all  on  one  side  of  the 
wardrobe  again,  and  I've  left  you  half  the  chest 
of  drawers;  so  don't  go  taking  pegs  that  don't 
belong  to  you!  I'm  very  glad  to  see  you  again, 
Blanche,  but  you  do  make  a  difference  to  the 
bedroom,  I  must  say." 

"Never  mind,"  said  Blanche;  "you'll  soon  have 
one  all  to  yourself  for  the  rest  of  your  life !" 

The  toast  was  in  the  fender  when  she  returned ; 
and  her  father,  a  moment  afterwards,  approached 
the  momentous  subject  facetiously. 

"So  we  are  going  to  be  married?"  he  said,  stir- 
ring his  tea.  "  'There  is  nothing  half  so  sweet 
in  life '    Is  the  happy  day  fixed?" 

"No;  it  isn't  fixed.  Mr.  Oliphant  is  coming  to 
see  you  all  to-morrow." 

"What  time,  my  dear?"  inquired  her  mother 
with  anxiety.  "Will  he  come  to  dinner?  We've 
been  dining  at  two  since  you've  been  away;  I 
suppose  while  you're  not  doing  anything,  we  may 
as  well  keep  to  it?" 

"It's  a  funny  time  to  dine,  isn't  it?  "What  was 
wrong  with  five?" 

"Well,  dear,  so  is  five  a  funny  time  for  any- 
body who  hasn't  to  play  at  night.  And  you've 
no  idea  how  much  cheaper  middle-day  dinner 
comes  out;  we  have  a  haddock  or  eggs  at  seven, 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  169 

and  it  only  means  a  meat  meal  once  a  day.  If 
you  don't  mind " 

"Oh,  it  doesn't  matter,"  said  the  girl,  shrug- 
ging her  shoulders;  "do  as  you  please — ask  him 
to  stay  to  eggs !" 

"We  shall  be  glad  to  see  Mr.  Oliphant,"  said 
the  author.  "But  is  he — I  hesitate  to  express 
myself,  Blanche!  Is  he  coming  to  ask  my 
opinion?  I  inquire  because  I'm  reluctant  to  tell 
you  my  opinion.  We  can't,  among  ourselves, 
ignore  the  fact  that  you  have,  from  time  to  time, 
been  of — er — assistance  to  the  household.  My 
opinion  might,  on  that  account,  be  misconstrued." 

"I  suppose  you  mean  you  don't  think  I  ought 
to  marry  him?"  she  said  for  answer. 

He  made  a  gesture  expressive  of  helplessness. 

"As  I  say,  I  hesitate  to  tell  you  what  I  think. 
It  seems  to  me  to  be  a  rash  step,  on  both  sides. 
You  have  always  been  a  clever  girl.  You've  the 
right  to  expect  a  husband  in  a  first-rate  position 
■ — your  good  looks,  your  talent,  all  give  you  the 
right.  If  you  waited,  there  is  no  doubt  you 
would  marry  into  a  good  position.  In  choosing 
a  young  man,  an  unknown  young  man,  in  an 
exceptionally  precarious  calling,  you  seem  to  me 
to  be  throwing  yourself  away.  But  though  this 
is  my  opinion,  it's  perhaps  not  worth  uttering, 


170  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

because — it's  painful  to  say — because  you  may 
believe  it  to  be  the  outcome  of  self-interest." 

"But  she  loves  him,  James,"  said  her  mother 
weakly. 

"My  dear!"  replied  Mr.  Ellerton  with  a  fine 
smile,  "we  are  not  discussing  the  plot  of  a  penny 
novelette." 

"I  don't  suppose  I  should  marry  into  Park 
Lane  if  I  waited  till  I  was  grey,"  murmured  the 
fiancee. 

"I  don't  suppose  you  would;  but  between  Park 
Lane  and  penury  there  are  a  great  many  grades. 
I  should  have  been  satisfied  to  see  you  engaged 
to  a  man  with  influence,  who  could  give  you  the 
chance  in  the  profession  that  you  deserve.  You 
would  have  been  a  celebrated  woman  then ;  I  am 

sure  of  it!    Now You  may  be  happy  now, 

if  domestic  lif e  can  content  you ;  but  I  fear  you'll 
never  be  celebrated.  You  may  go  on  struggling, 
but  you're  handicapping  yourself;  instead  of 
marriage  helping  you  forward,  it  will  drag  you 
back.  I've  heard  you  express  your  own  views 
of  marriages  like  this ;  why  have  they  changed  all 
of  a  sudden?"  He  regarded  her  with  an  air  of 
innocent  surprise.  "Why  have  they  changed  all 
of  a  sudden?"  he  repeated.  "And  further,  I  am 
sorry  for  Mr.  Oliphant!  For  him,  too,  it's  a 
blunder.    Marriage  is  the  end  of  a  man's  youth. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  171 

By  himself  Mr.  Oliphant  might  rise,  but  you 
and  your  babies  will  be  a  weight  that'll  ruin  him. 
Don't  I  know  what  it  is — the  strain  of  support- 
ing a  wife  and  family?  Don't  I  know  what  it 
is  to  be  crippled  for  life  by  an  early  marriage? 
My  dear  girl,  the  best  woman  becomes  a  burden 
to  a  man!"  The  wife  who  was  keeping  him 
winced,  and  her  eyes  filled.  She  did  not  speak, 
however.  "No,  Blanche,  since  you  really  want 
to  know  what  I  think,  I  think  you  are  behaving 
like  a  short-sighted  child.  The  difference  your 
marriage  will  make  to  us  is  not  vital — I  shall 
have  to  write  a  little  more,  that  is  all — but  the 
difference  it  will  make  to  you,  to  say  nothing  of 
him,  I  regret.    Yes;  I  regret  it." 

"I  thought  you  would,"  she  said  insolently. 
"Well,  I'm  going  to  marry  him!  And  you  may 
talk  till  you're  tired — and  I  shall  marry  him!" 

There  was  a  long  silence  in  the  room.  Ger- 
trude's attention  reverted  to  the  coat,  which  had 
been  tossed  on  to  the  sofa,  and  she  wondered  how 
much  it  had  cost,  and  mentally  compared  it  with 
some  coats  that  had  been  "marked  down"  last 
month  at  a  local  sale.  Mr.  Ellerton  lit  a  pipe 
with  dignified  deliberation,  and  the  mother  bent 
her  wet  eyes  on  the  fire,  pitying  everybody  except 
herself.  She  would  have  liked  to  feel  the  girl's 
head  in  her  lonely  lap,  and  receive  confidences 


172  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

and  caresses,  and  plan  the  trousseau;  but  that 
was  how  things  happened  in  her  novelettes  at 
which  they  all  laughed. 

"Won't  you  have  some  more  tea,  James?"  she 
said  at  last,  with  a  nervous  effort  to  sound  at  ease. 

"No,  thank  you,"  replied  the  novelist,  rising 
with  a  heavy  sigh;  "no  more.  I'm  afraid  I 
can't  spare  the  time ;  I  must  go  back  to  the  study, 
my  dear,  and  work!" 


CHAPTER  XII 

When  Royce,  rehearsing  Faust  at  the  Pan- 
theon, dwelt  on  the  fact  that  only  a  year  before 
he  had  been  reduced  to  sixpenny  dinners,  while 
he  awaited  his  first  London  "appearance"  at  a 
salary  of  two  pounds  a  week,  he  thought  how 
amazed  he  ought  to  feel  at  his  progress.  This  is 
as  near  to  being  amazed  at  our  progress  as  we 
ever  get. 

He  had  removed  to  rooms  in  Brunswick 
Square,  which  is  a  better  address  than  Burton 
Crescent,  and  where  he  was  on  the  whole  less 
comfortable,  though  he  paid  more  rent.  How- 
ever, he  did  not  propose  to  stay  there  long.  Un- 
less his  Faust  proved  a  failure  and  he  received 
his  dismissal,  Blanche  and  he  might  as  well  be 
happy  soon  as  late.  The  girl  no  longer  demurred, 
and  it  was  arranged  that  they  should  marry  early 
in  February  soon  after  the  play  was  produced. 

The  usual  honeymoon  would,  of  course,  be 
impossible,  and  they  meant  to  have  the  ceremony 
on  a  Saturday,  and  go  by  the  eleven  fifty-five 

173 


174  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

train  at  night  to  Brighton,  where  they  could 
remain  till  Monday  afternoon. 

Mr.  Ellerton  had  spared  the  young  man  the 
arguments  that  he  had  wasted  on  the  fiancee, 
realising  that  since  they  had  failed  with  his 
daughter,  it  would  be  futile  to  repeat  them  to  her 
lover.  Excepting  that  his  air  was  rather  gran- 
diose indeed,  Oliphant  had  found  nothing  to  com- 
plain of  in  his  future  father-in-law.  Gertrude 
was  monosyllabic,  and  apparently  characterless; 
and  Mrs.  Ellerton  he  liked.  It  was  with  her  that 
he  and  Blanche  discussed  where  they  should  live. 

She  considered  that  they  would  be  very  unwise 
to  take  a  house,  even  the  cheapest;  for  though 
they  might  expect  to  stay  in  town,  who  could  say 
but  what  they  would  both  be  on  tour  again  to- 
gether before  long? — desirous  as  they  were  of 
playing  in  the  same  theatre,  it  was  likely  enough ! 
Blanche  inclined  towards  a  small  flat,  but  the 
same  objection  applied  to  this;  so  they  agreed 
that,  after  all,  the  only  plan  was  to  make  them- 
selves comfortable  in  furnished  apartments  at 
first.  Furnished  apartments  where  they  would 
put  out  their  photographs  and  not  have  to  pack 
them  up  again  at  the  end  of  a  week,  would  really 
be  quite  like  home,  she  said.  She  privately  de- 
termined that  they  should  not  be  at  Earl's  Courts 
however.    She  meant,  when  she  married,  to  begin 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  175 

to  form  a  circle  of  useful  people,  and  she  didn't 
want  her  family  dropping  in  on  her  at  inoppor- 
tune moments :  father,  who  always  referred  to  his 
books,  which  nobody  knew,  and  made  one  feel 
so  ashamed!  and  mother,  with  her  ridiculous 
novelettes  in  papers  that  no  one  had  heard  of 
either!  and  Gertrude,  who  as  soon  as  she  learnt 
that  a  man  was  expected,  would  always  be  fish- 
ing for  an  invitation  to  come  and  play  her  fiddle ! 
Oh  no,  Earl's  Court  would  be  simply  hateful! 
It  was  a  pity  that  a  flat  was  out  of  the  question 
— a  flat  somehow  suggested  a  circle.  But  the 
privilege  of  living  on  the  fourth  floor  or  in  the 
basement,  and  viewing  a  blank  wall  from  every 
window,  was  very  expensive,  and  if  they  were 
to  be  away  eight  or  nine  months  of  the  year,  the 
establishment  would  certainly  be  a  white  ele- 
phant. It  would  not  do  for  Royce  to  assume 
too  heavy  responsibilities;  preserve  her  from 
leaving  one  atmosphere  of  money  worries  for 
another! — she  wanted  a  respite  from  hearing 
about  the  bills.  Besides,  remembering  their  pro- 
fession, nice  apartments  would  look  natural 
enough. 

The  date  on  which  the  first  performance  of 
Faust  was  to  take  place  found  Oliphant  sick  with 
suspense.  There  was  no  rehearsal,  and  he  went 
out  to  the  Ellertons'  in  the  morning,  and  gath- 


176  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

ered  encouragement  from  the  mouth  of  his  Be- 
loved. Although,  when  he  received  the  offer,  he 
had  declared  that  he  would  tremble  to  know  she 
was  present  on  the  first  night,  he  had  since  re- 
canted. They  were  engaged,  and  so  it  was 
different;  it  was  essential  that  she  should  be 
there!  He  had  brought  four  dress-circle  tickets 
to  the  house  a  few  days  earlier,  and  this  morning 
Blanche  gave  him  a  bunch  of  violets  from  her 
bodice  for  luck. 

In  a  tumbler  of  water  it  stood  all  the  evening 
on  his  dressing-table  among  the  sticks  of  grease- 
paint; and  after  each  act,  when  he  came  off  the 
stage,  he  touched  it.  And  though  her  violets 
were  not  responsible,  he  liked  to  think  they  had 
had  something  to  do  with  his  success  when  he 
read  his  notices  on  the  morrow.  For  finally  and 
with  certainty  he  had  "arrived."  He  could  not 
have  acknowledged  it  to  Blanche — though  he 
objected  to  perceive  that  he  couldn't — but  in  a 
fervour  of  thanksgiving  he  dropped  on  his  knees 
among  the  newspapers  and  muttered  to  God. 

The  girl's  felicitations  were  wholly  sincere  this 
time — he  pertained  to  her  now ;  and  had  not  per- 
tained to  her  sufficiently  long  for  her  to  begin  to 
say:  "So  much  we  are  one — and  so  much  I  am  I, 
and  you  are  you!" 

And  it  was  with  pride  that  she  asked  the 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  177 

Editors  of  The  Era  and  The  Stage  to  insert 
paragraphs  announcing  that  Miss  Blanche  Eller- 
ton,  who  had  "created"  the  part  of  "Lady  Maud 
Elstree"  in  Mr.  Royce  Oliphant's  drama  The 
Impostor,  was  engaged  to  be  married  to  him. 
Oliphant  asked  her  why  she  did  it,  and  she  re- 
plied: "Silly  Billy,  isn't  it  always  a  free  adver- 
tisement for  us  both?" 

And  it  was  two  or  three  weeks  after  The 
Speaker  and  The  World  had  confirmed  the  pro- 
nouncement of  all  the  dailies,  that  he  and  she 
went  to  Brighton  by  the  eleven  fifty-five. 

The  wedding  had  been  the  quietest  possible. 
For  one  thing  the  Ellertons  could  not  afford  an 
expensive  breakfast,  and  for  another,  neither  the 
bride  nor  the  groom  had  many  intimate  friends. 
So  simple  had  it  been  that  Royce  even  lacked  a 
best  man ;  the  men  whom  he  knew  best  were  mar- 
ried and  ineligible  for  the  post.  As  for  Otho 
Fairbairn,  apart  from  the  objection  that  to  ask 
him  would  be  to  ask  for  an  expensive  present, 
he  had  been  heard  of  only  once — full  of  a  yacht 
and  vague  projects — since  the  night  when  he 
came  "behind"  at  the  Dominion.  After  the  serv- 
ice there  was  cold  chicken  and  a  sort  of  cham- 
pagne in  the  drawing-room;  and  maternal  tears 
and  a  literary  speech.  And  then  Royce  went 
away,   leaving  his  wife  with  her   family.     He 


178  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

could  not  see  her  from  the  stage  during  the  eve- 
ning, but  he  knew  she  was  up  in  the  dress-circle 
again ;  and  when  the  curtain  fell  she  went  round 
to  the  stage-door  and  waited  for  him.  And  it 
wasn't  a  hansom  in  which  he  drove  with  her 
to  Victoria,  it  was  a  celestial  car,  and  the  occu- 
pants of  the  ordinary  cabs  in  the  Strand  received 
his  compassion.  Poor  people  who  were  not  just 
married!  She  was  his  wife,  his  wife,  his  wife! 
This  was  the  moment  when  both  first  realised  it. 
Emotion  kept  him  voiceless,  and  while  they  sped 
between  the  passing  lights  to  the  jingle  of  the 
horse's  bell,  the  girl  herself  asked  nothing  better 
than  to  be  allowed  to  dream. 

It  wasn't  a  celestial  car  in  which  he  drove  with 
her  from  Victoria  to  their  apartments  when  they 
returned,  it  was  a  hansom;  still  they  were  both 
very  happy.  They  had  decided  upon  Maddox 
Street;  and  when  they  entered  their  drawing- 
room  the  table  was  laid  for  five-o'clock  dinner, 
for  which  they  were  a  little  late.  A  few  things 
went  wrong — not  quite  so  agreeable  as  the  hotel ! 
But  that  was  natural;  and  the  landlady  and  the 
servant  would  soon  fall  into  their  ways.  The 
photographs,  and  a  plant  or  two  put  about,  would 
give  the  room  a  homely  air.  And  they  would 
have  some  cut  flowers  on  the  mantel-piece  every 
morning.     With  Bond  Street  on  one  side  and 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  179 

Regent  Street  on  the  other,  it  would  be  quite 
easy  to  obtain  a  plentiful  supply. 

About  half -past  six  her  husband  left  for  the 
theatre,  and  then  Blanche  lay  on  the  sofa  before 
the  fire  and  mused.  Her  first  reflection  was  that 
they  must  buy  a  couple  of  cushions;  and  next 
she  perceived  that  if  they  hired  an  upright  piano, 
it  would  improve  the  aspect  of  the  room  very 
much.  A  good  piano,  left  open,  always  looked 
well.  She  thought  she  would  have  a  black  one, 
and  get  a  gilt  basket  of  red  azaleas  to  stand  care- 
lessly on  the  top. 

So  she  was  married — it  was  very  wonderful! 
He  was  a  dear  fellow.  Would  she  ever  be  sorry? 
.  .  .  N-no. 

Ah,  she  knew  there  was  something  she  had 
meant  to  do !  A  cab  accident  that  they  witnessed 
in  the  King's  Road  had  suggested  the  idea.  She 
rang  the  bell,  and  borrowed  a  bottle  of  ink  from 
the  landlady,  and  went  into  the  bedroom  and 
unpacked  her  writing  materials.  While  she  was 
in  the  bedroom,  though,  she  might  as  well  get 
into  her  dressing-gown.  When  Royce  came  back 
she  would  look  nice  lying  on  the  sofa  in  her 
dressing-gown.  Its  tint  was  pale  blue,  and  she 
had  a  pair  of  slippers  to  match  it,  embellished 
with  little  paste  buckles.  When  she  had  put  on 
the  wrapper,  and  the  slippers,  she  pulled  all  the 


180  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

pins  from  her  hair,  and  shook  it  over  her  shoul- 
ders, smiling  in  the  glass  at  her  folly.  She  did 
indeed  look  very  charming  so;  and  she  returned 
to  the  drawing-room  complacently.  She  drew 
a  chair  to  the  table,  and  dipped  her  pen  in  the 
ink,  and  meditated.  .  .  .  "An  accident  which 
might   have   turned   a  joyful   occasion   into   a 

tragedy "     No,  that  wasn't  good;  and  she 

wanted  to  begin  with  her  name — the  name  always 
stood  out  more  then.  "Miss  Blanche  Ellerton, 
who  was  married  on  Saturday  last  to  Mr.  Royce 
Oliphant,  narrowly  escaped  having  no  honey- 
moon  "  She  nibbled  the  penholder;  "nar- 
rowly escaped  having  no  honeymoon"  didn't 
sound  right — was  it,  or  wasn't  it,  what  she  meant? 
An  accident  like  the  one  that  had  occurred  to 
somebody  else  in  Brighton  might  easily  have 
happened  to  her  and  him  when  they  were  driving 
from  the  Pantheon  on  Saturday  night — she 
might  have  been  taken  to  a  hospital  instead  of 
to  Brighton.  "Miss  Blanche  Ellerton,  who  was 
married  on  Saturday  last  to  Mr.  Royce  Oli- 
phant"— what  a  pity  she  couldn't  say  at  St. 
Peter's,  Eaton  Square — "had  an  experience 
which  fortunately  does  not  fall  to  many  brides. 
As  the  newly-married  pair  were  driving  to  the 

station   the   horse    fell   down,    and "      Fell 

down?     Should  one  say  "fell  down"   or  only 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  181 

"fell"?     Cross  out  the  "down"  anyhow!     "The 

horse  fell,  and "    Well,  and  what?    It  was 

a  beastly  difficult  thing  to  write  a  paragraph ! 

She  plunged  her  fingers  into  the  unpinned 
hair,  and  stared  at  her  paper,  with  a  frown. 

She  had  only  just  completed  the  task  when 
Oliphant  came  in. 

"Look!"  she  said  triumphantly. 

"I  am  looking,"  said  he;  "what  a  vision!" 

"Oh,"  she  murmured  against  his  mouth,  "that's 
not  what  I  meant;  I  meant  what  I've  written! 
I'm  going  to  post  it  in  the  morning." 

His  expression  was  less  proud  when  he  had 
read  the  paragraph. 

"Do  you — do  you  think  that's  necessary?"  he 
said.  "I  can't  say  it's  the  sort  of  thing  I  believe 
in!  It's  very  questionable  if  they'll  print  it; 
and  if  they  do " 

"If  they  do,  what?" 

"The  taste  is  questionable  still." 

"Why,  Royce,"  she  exclaimed  with  surprise, 
"what  do  you  mean?  You  know  the  value  of  a 
paragraph  surely?  The  more  one  can  get,  the 
better;  and  poor  me,  I  seldom  get  oner 

"But  this  isn't  true.  I  hate  lies  even  if  they 
don't  hurt  anybody." 

"  'Lies'  is  a  werry  big  word  to  use  about  it. 


182  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

And  don't  you  ever  say  anything  that  isn't  quite 
true,  milord?" 

"I  suppose  I've  told  a  good  many  'polite'  lies; 
I've  never  told  one  for  my  own  advantage  that 
I  remember." 

She  gave  him  a  little  kiss  on  the  cheek,  and 
held  up  a  finger  laughingly. 

"It's  a  good  thing  you  have  a  business  woman 
to  take  care  of  you  at  last.  Oh,  Silly  Billy !  Well, 
what  have  you  got  to  tell  me?  I  suppose  you 
had  a  packed  house  as  usual?" 

She  found  the  evenings  dull  during  his  absence, 
and  was  eager  for  another  engagement.  Some- 
times, however,  she  took  a  hansom  up  to  the 
Pantheon  about  eleven  o'clock,  and  they  went  to 
supper  at  a  restaurant.  This  was  jolly.  They 
seldom  chose  the  same  place  twice,  because  the 
restaurants  were  new  to  them  both,  and  they 
wished  to  gain  experience.  Royce  took  her  to 
Dolibo's  first  of  all.  It  was  his  second  visit  there, 
and  when  he  had  gone  with  Rayne,  he  and  she 
had  never  met.  So  they  were  bound  to  drink 
champagne!  And  on  subsequent  evenings  when 
they  went  to  supper,  if  they  had  not  had  cham- 
pagne, the  jaunt  would  have  seemed  rather  a 
falling-off. 

The  proximity  of  Bond  Street  provided  them 
with  a  very  pleasant  thoroughfare  to  stroll  in  on 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  183 

fine  afternoons.  It  did  not  cost  two  persons  the 
amount  of  Royce's  salary  to  live,  even  with  occa- 
sional suppers  in  restaurants,  and  so  they  could 
look  at  the  shop-windows  and  buy  hats.  It  was 
not  a  solitary  occurrence  for  them  to  disagree 
as  to  which  hat  became  her  better;  and  when  he 
had  yielded  to  her  opinion,  he  begged  her  to  yield 
to  his — and  she  said  that  it  was  "simply  prodigal" 
of  him,  and  that  she  wouldn't  hear  of  such  a 
thing.  But  he  came  out  victorious.  They  liked 
to  saunter  through  the  Burlington  Arcade  also. 
The  early  illumination  of  the  windows  there  often 
lured  them  in  from  the  cold  daylight  of  Picca- 
dilly; and  the  gloves,  and  the  garters,  and  the 
notepaper  were  attractive  trifles  to  a  man  with 
a  fascinating  woman  by  his  side.  After  all,  they 
were  practically  on  their  honeymoon,  though  they 
were  in  town ;  and  a  very  cosy  honeymoon  it  was. 
Just  as  they  had  prophesied,  the  landlady  "fell 
into  their  ways"  with  the  ready  perception  that 
distinguishes  the  genus — and  the  "extras"  in 
their  bills  were  a  sight  to  see. 

When  they  had  been  in  Maddox  Street  about 
six  weeks  Blanche  was  offered  an  engagement  at 
the  Sceptre.  She  was  to  receive  eight  pounds  a 
week.  This  did  not  seem  so  startling  to  her  as  it 
would  have  done  before  Oliphant  went  to  the 
Pantheon,  but  she  still  counted  it  high  terms,  and 


184  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

she  was  very  much  elated.  Royce  was  pleased 
by  the  news  because  it  pleased  her,  and  it  was 
not  until  after  she  had  come  home  with  the  part 
folded  in  her  muff  that  their  first  difference  arose. 

From  a  professional  point  of  view  it  was  an 
extremely  good  part;  from  Oliphant's,  it  was  a 
very  offensive  one.  She  was  to  play  a  courtesan ; 
and  as  courtesans  in  drama  are  much  more  bril- 
liant than  courtesans  in  life,  she  had  to  utter 
several  epigrams  which  he  objected  to  his  wife's 
delivering.  He  tried  to  induce  her  to  cancel  the 
engagement,  and  their  argument  grew  heated. 

"I  never  heard  anything  so  ridiculous!"  she 

exclaimed;  "it  is  simply  philistine!  I Really 

I'm  surprised  at  you !  Cancel  it?  Why,  my  dear 
boy,  if  I  make  a  hit  at  the  Sceptre,  just  look  what 
it  means  I  One  would  think  you  were  I  don't 
know  what." 

"I'm  your  husband,"  he  replied;  "that's  what 
I  am.  I  respect  you,  darling;  the  greater  the 
hit  you  made,  the  worse  I  should  feel." 

"Thank  you,"  she  said  indignantly. 

"Don't  misunderstand  me  on  purpose.  The 
point  is " 

"The  point  is  that  you're  being  philistine, 
simply  philistine!" 

"Yes,  you  said  that  before.  It's  always  you 
who  find  me  philistine — I  don't  think  I   was 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  185 

thought  so  by  anyone  else.  Come,  don't  let's 
wrangle,  Blanche" — he  sat  down  on  the  couch, 
and  put  his  arm  round  her  waist — "you  know 
yourself  it  isn't  a  nice  part;  now,  is  it?" 

"I  don't  think  that's  the  way  to  look  at  it  at 
all;  I  didn't  know  you  did  look  at  things  in  that 
way.  I've  heard  you  say  that  a  dramatist  should 
be  free  to  take  any  characters  he  pleased — the 
most  abandoned.    Haven't  you?" 

"I  never  said  I  wanted  my  wife  to  play  them," 
answered  Oliphant  doggedly. 

"Oh!"  She  left  his  side,  and  walked  about  the 
room.  "You're  not  consistent.  I'm  an  artist. 
I  don't  recognise  such  rotten  suburban  distinc- 
tions! I  thought  you  were  an  actor,  Royce. 
Upon  my  word  you  make  me  gasp !" 

"Put  yourself  in  my  place!  Is  it  astonishing 
that  I  should  blush  to  know  my  wife  was  sneer- 
ing at  decency  every  evening  to  make  a  crowd 
titter?  I  hope  I  am  an  actor,  but  I  was  a  man 
first." 

"Oh,  yes — and  you  were  going  to  be  a  parson 
first!  To  hear  you  talk,  I — I  almost  think  it's 
a  pity  you  changed  your  mind." 

Oliphant  did  not  reply  for  some  seconds.  The 
colour  had  gone  out  of  his  face,  and  his  eyes  were 
angry. 

"As  a  matter  of  fact,"  he  said  in  a  sharp  voice, 


186  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"there  is  no  question  of  my  consistency  here,  for 
the  part  has  nothing  to  do  with  art." 

"You  know  a  great  deal  about  the  piece,  don't 
you,"  she  retorted,  "considering  you  didn't  hear 
it  read?" 

"I  know  what  the  man  is  capable  of  who  wrote 
it,  and  I  know  this  character.  'Character'? 
There's  no  character  in  it,  only  cheap  cynicism. 
'There  is  some  soul  of  goodness  in  things  evil'! 
But  what  does  this  teach;  what  is  it  for? — she 
isn't  a  woman.  She  came  out  of  a  writing-table 
to  wear  Paris  frocks  and  amuse  the  stalls." 

"Oh!"  she  cried;  "  'Teach'?  'For'?  She's  for 
eight  pounds  a  week  and  to  get  big  notices! 
Don't  be  a  fool." 

"Blanche!" 

"Well,  you  shouldn't  irritate  me.  I  think  it's 
very  cruel  of  you  to  make  childish  difficulties, 
instead  of  being  nice  and  congratulating  me  on 
my  good  luck.  I  do,  Royce" — she  whimpered  a 
little,  and  pressed  her  handkerchief  to  her  eyes — 
"I  think  it's  very  cruel!" 

"Blanche!"  It  was  a  different  "Blanche"  this 
time. 

"You — you've  disappointed  me  very  much.  I 
came  home  so  happy." 

"Oh,  dearest,  don't  say  that — that  hurts." 

"I  thought  we  were  one;  I  thought  we  entered 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  187 

into  each  other's  hopes  so  thoroughly,"  she  fal- 
tered behind  the  handkerchief. 

"We  do;  we  always  shall,"  he  said,  trying  to 
take  her  hand. 

"And  this  engagement — you  know  what  it 
might  mean  to  me?" 

"But  you  might  get  another  just  as  good.  You 
might " 

"No,  I  should  be  turning  my  back  on  fortune; 
it  would  never  come  again — or  not  for  years.  Do 
good  engagements  keep  knocking  at  one's  door? 
I  didn't  want  to  feel  that  our  marriage  was  going 
to  hinder  me  in  any,  any  way — I  didn't!" 

She  suffered  him  to  capture  the  hand  now,  and 
draw  her  to  him;  to  dry  her  tears — and  bring  a 
smile  to  her  pathetic  lips  by  the  assurance  that  he 
"wouldn't  say  any  more." 


CHAPTER  XIII 

And  being  a  decidedly  clever  actress,  she  made 
a  success  at  the  Sceptre.  Her  name  became 
familiar  to  London  playgoers,  who,  knowing 
nothing  of  the  apprenticeship  that  she  and  her 
husband  had  served  in  the  provinces,  while  their 
hearts  grew  sick  with  hope  deferred,  spoke — as 
playgoers  do  speak — of  Royce  Oliphant  and 
Blanche  Ellerton  having  "come  out  at  the 
Dominion  last  year."  To  the  actor,  who  is  so 
fortunate  as  Oliphant  only  in  exceptional  cases, 
and  has  often  grown  grey  in  his  calling  before 
he  obtains  recognition  in  London,  this  phrase 
"come  out"  has  its  humour. 

The  earliest  days  of  June  brought  Royce  his 
first  professional  worry  since  his  marriage.  The 
Impostor,  which  he  fervently  wished  would  sink 
into  oblivion,  had  been  sent  on  tour  again.  Rayne 
was  now  deriving  a  small  profit  from  it,  and  there 
were  insignificant  author's  fees.  One  morning 
when  Oliphant  received  the  Chester-le- Street 
notices  from  the  Press-cutting  agency  to  which 

188 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  189 

he  had  subscribed,  he  was  astonished  to  discover 
that  the  last  act  of  his  play  had  been  entirely- 
rewritten.    He  could  scarcely  believe  his  eyes. 

"I  won't  stand  it!"  he  cried,  rising  excitedly; 
"the  thing's  monstrous;  I'll  have  it  stopped! 
Rayne  has  turned  The  Impostor  into  a  burlesque 
— he's  holding  me  up  to  ridicule  all  over  Eng- 
land!" 

"What  do  you  mean?"  asked  Blanche. 
"Turned  it  into  a  burlesque?" 

"Look  at  this!  He,  or  some  other  ass,  has 
written  a  new  act.  Clement  is  sent  to  Portland, 
and  escapes  to  France.  And  Maud  and  Mrs. 
Vaughan  fight  a  duel — fight  a  duel! — about  him 
with  swords.  They  fight  a  duel — two  English 
ladies ! — here  it  is  in  print !" 

"Why  the  man  must  be  insane !"  she  exclaimed. 
"Maud  and  Mrs.  Vaughan  fight  a  duel?  You 
should  go  and  see  him  at  once." 

But  Rayne  was  not  visible;  and  being  in  a 
theatre  every  evening  for  three  hours,  he  thought 
himself  much  too  busy  a  man  to  answer  a  letter. 
Then  Oliphant  sought  Counsel's  opinion,  and 
there  was,  of  course,  no  doubt  that  he  could 
obtain  an  injunction.  Theatrical  advisers,  how- 
ever, pointed  out  that  if  he  took  the  matter  into 
court,  Rayne  would  probably  declare  that  the 
drama,   as  it  left  Mr.   Oliphant's  hands,   had 


190  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

proved  so  disastrous  that  "there  wasn't  a  man- 
ager who  would  give  it  a  date."  The  statement 
might  not  be  accurate,  but  it  would  be  damaging. 
And  after  all,  the  company  was  only  visiting  the 
"smalls,"  where  not  more  than  two  persons  in 
five  hundred  would  observe  who  wrote  the  play, 
or  remember,  if  they  observed.  On  the  whole 
he  was  recommended — for  various  reasons — to 
submit  to  the  outrage  until  Rayne's  rights  in  the 
property  expired. 

So  the  hero  continued  to  escape  to  France, 
and  two  English  ladies  continued  to  fight  a  duel 
about  him ;  and  those  among  the  audience  who 
had  the  sense  to  laugh,  continued  to  imagine  that 
the  author  whose  name  stood  on  the  play-bill  was 
the  ignoramus  that  they  were  entitled  to  laugh  at. 

"And  at  any  rate,"  said  Blanche,  "if  it  plays 
to  better  business  with  the  alteration — and  I  sup- 
pose Rayne  reckons  it  will — you'll  get  bigger 
fees;  don't  forget  that!" 

Royce  looked  at  her  without  answering;  and 
though  the  subject  burned  within  him,  he  never 
mentioned  it  at  home  any  more. 

Four  months  of  matrimony  had  been  ample  to 
display  the  disparity  of  their  points  of  view. 
He  had  a  pretty  wife,  and — as  she  would  be 
judged  in  "the  profession" — a  talented  wife;  but 
he  had  no  companion,  and  never  would  have  one. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  191 

It  was  his  own  fault,  he  was  quite  aware  of  it. 
He  had  made  a  mistake;  but  that  it  was  a  mis- 
take for  which  he  would  have  to  suffer  all  his 
life  did  not  lessen  the  weight  upon  his  mind  as  he 
realised  it.  She  was  fond  of  describing  herself 
as  an  artist,  and  when  they  disagreed  upon  prac- 
tical matters,  she  insisted  also  that  she  was  a 
business  woman ;  but  to  him  she  appeared  a  busi- 
ness woman  always,  and  an  artist  only  when  she 
was  behind  the  footlights.  She  was  an  actress, 
he  did  not  deny  that — and  it  was  a  puzzle  to  him 
how  she  was  able  to  project  herself  into  a  part — 
but  her  taste  in  dramatic  literataire  was  nil.  She 
cared  no  more  about  the  quality  of  a  play  in 
which  she  was  engaged  than  did  the  scene- 
painters.  For  a  piece  to  "run"  was  everything 
that  she  had  imagined  anybody  could  ask  of  it. 
"Success"  to  her  was  the  last  word;  and  succes 
d'estime  was  the  French  for  failure.  Money  was 
spent  freely  in  the  Maddox  Street  rooms,  but  he 
never  saw  her  spend  a  shilling  on  a  book,  and 
rarely  saw  her  read  one.  Their  conversation 
yielded  nothing,  was  barren,  dry  as  ashes  in  his 
mouth.  He  could  not  talk  to  her  as  he  wanted 
to  talk  to  someone,  because  the  references,  the 
comparisons  he  made,  had  no  significance  to  her, 
and  she  found  his  attitude  towards  the  theatre 
wholly    incomprehensible.      They   had    at    this 


192  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

period  only  two  interests  in  common.  One  was 
the  removal  they  were  about  to  make  to  a  small 
furnished  flat  in  Victoria  Street — she  wanted  a 
flat,  and  it  was  a  more  sensible  arrangement  than 
living  in  lodgings  and  wasting  half  his  salary 
outside ;  the  other  was  the  child  that  was  expected 
to  be  born  to  them  at  the  end  of  November. 

It  may  be  thought  that  these  meant  a  good 
deal,  but  wherever  their  home  might  be,  Oliphant 
must  live  chiefly  within  himself;  and  as  to  the 
child — well,  she  had  hurt  him  very  much  about 
the  child,  and  though  he  tried  to  forget  it,  the 
pride  of  anticipation  that  he  might  have  felt  was 
absent.  She  was  now  resigning  herself  to  the 
idea  of  becoming  a  mother;  but  he  had  known 
nothing  until  she  had  suffered  in  secret,  and  made 
herself  ill;  and  when  he  reproached  her,  she  had 
turned  from  him,  crying  passionately  that  "This 
would  prevent  her  following  up  her  Sceptre  suc- 
cess, and  now  she  would  be  out  of  a  shop  all 
through  the  autumn!" 

Of  her  parents  and  sister  he  saw  little.  No 
mother-in-law  could  have  been  less  obtrusive  than 
was  Mrs.  Ellerton.  Oliphant  had  gathered 
enough  of  the  family's  circumstances  to  under- 
stand that  they  must  miss  their  daughter's  help, 
and  he  assumed  that  some  of  Blanche's  eight 
pounds  went  to  Earl's  Court  every  week.     She 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  193 

did  not  tell  him  that  it  was  so,  and  he  did  not 
inquire;  nor,  if  he  had  been  better  versed  in  the 
prices  of  West  End  dressmakers,  would  any 
question  have  been  necessary. 

They  moved  into  the  flat  on  the  4th  of  June. 
Blanche's  engagement  at  the  Sceptre  would  soon 
terminate,  but  at  the  Pantheon  Faust  was  run- 
ning still.  Next  month  the  house  would  be 
temporarily  sub-let,  while  the  annual  tour  was 
made.  Whether  he  would  be  offered  a  re-engage- 
ment for  Greatorex's  next  production,  Oliphant 
did  not  know;  he  only  hoped.  It  was  reported 
that  this  was  to  be  Romeo  and  Juliet. 

The  photographs  and  sofa-cushions  had  not 
been  transferred  to  Victoria  Street  quite  a  week 
when  he  received  a  note  at  the  theatre  from  Otho 
Fairbairn,  apologising  for  so  long  a  silence,  and 
begging  him  to  make  an  appointment.  They 
lunched  together  two  days  later,  and  Fairbairn 
was  found  paler  and  older-looking  than  when 
Royce  had  seen  him  last.  He  wrung  the  actor's 
hand  heartily,  and  said  how  delighted  he  had 
been  to  discover  the  name  "Oliphant"  in  the 
Pantheon  cast. 

"I  thought  you  might  be  acting  in  town,  and 
was  going  to  read  all  the  names  'under  the  clock' 
on  the  chance.  Lo,  you  were  high  in  the  list! 
You've  done  well,  Royce!" 


194.  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"Where  have  you  been?"  asked  Oliphant. 

"I'm  a  pig — I've  made  fifty  resolutions  to 
write  to  you ;  but  I — I've  been  in  a  good  deal  of 
trouble,  old  fellow;  you  must  forgive  me." 

"I'm  sorry  to  hear  that!  May  I  know — is  it 
private?" 

"Well,  I  was  engaged  to  be  married,"  said 
Fairbairn,  "and  the  lady  changed  her  mind.  I've 
been  in  New  York,  you  know — she  was  an 
American  girl.  I  was  very  fond  of  her ;  but  she 
discovered  that  she  liked  somebody  else  better. 
It  leaves  one  rather  raw,  that  sort  of  thing."  He 
laughed  drearily.  "She  didn't  treat  me  well,  but 
my  dollars  weren't  so  startling  on  the  other  side 
— lots  of  the  Americans  have  more — it  was  a  pity 
the  governor  didn't  live  to  buy  a  title!  .  .  . 
Never  mind  about  me — I  want  to  hear  about 
yourself.    What  have  you  been  doing?" 

Oliphant  hesitated.  "Well,"  he  said,  "I— I 
have  married." 

"No?  Is  that  a  fact?  My  warmest  congratu- 
lations !    Married !" 

"I  married  Miss  Ellerton — she  played  in  my 
piece  at  the  Dominion.  We're  living  in  Victoria 
Street.  You  must  come  and  dine  with  us;  or 
lunch  with  us — our  dinner-hour  would  be  rather 
barbaric  to  you.     We  don't  do  things  in  style, 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  195 

but  we  can  give  you  an  edible  lunch — there's  a 
restaurant  downstairs,  and  they  feed  us." 

"It  must  be  devilish  jolly,"  said  the  other. 
"So  you  married  an " 

"I  married  an  actress,  yes;  and  a  very  clever 
actress." 

"The  wisest  thing  you  could  do,  of  course!  A 
wife  in  one's  own  profession  must  be  ideal.  When 
was  it?" 

"We  were  married  at  the  beginning  of  Febru- 
ary. What  day  will  you  come? — the  sooner  the 
better." 

Fairbairn  was  free  to  go  the  next  afternoon, 
and  Blanche  put  on  the  frock  that  suited  her  best 
for  his  subjugation.  She  had  learnt  the  details 
of  his  offer  to  back  Royce  in  a  theatre,  and  she 
intended  that  he  should  develop  into  a  constant 
visitor  now  that  he  had  returned  to  England. 

He  found  his  hostess  informal  and  charming; 
and  Oliphant  was  in  high  spirits,  perceiving  that 
she  had  made  a  good  impression.  Conversation 
did  not  flag,  and  soon  became  frankly  profes- 
sional in  tone;  for  Fairbairn  was  interested  in 
their  prospects,  and  put  a  good  many  ques- 
tions, and,  although  he  now  believed  himself  a 
misogynist,  there  was  a  fascination  to  him,  an 
outsider,  in  hearing  an  actress  chatter  about  the 
stage.     To  Blanche  it  was  even  more  novel  te 


196  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

entertain  a  young  man  who  possessed  a  splendid 
income;  and  when  he  inadvertently  said  he  must 
have  been  "staying  at  Brookhill"  at  the  date  soma 
comedy  was  produced,  and  she  discovered  that 
he  meant  the  place  of  a  peer,  she  dared  not  look 
at  him  lest  she  should  betray  the  sensation  that 
the  announcement  had  caused  her. 

He  took  leave  of  her  with  the  consciousness 
of  having  spent  three  hours  as  agreeable  as  mis- 
ogyny permitted,  and  his  assurance  that  he  would 
drop  in  upon  them  often  was  no  less  sincere  than 
the  lady's  petition  that  he  would  do  so.  She 
regarded  Royce  respectfully  for  being  the  friend 
of  "such  a  swell" ;  and  when  they  received  a  note 
in  which  Fairbairn  trusted  that  it  wasn't  too  late 
to  send  a  wedding  present,  and  they  found  that 
the  present  was  silver  suitable  for  a  prince's 
dinner-party,  her  "lively  sense  of  favours  to 
come"  knew  literally  no  bounds. 

"How  much  money  does  one  need  to  take  a 
theatre?"  she  inquired  eagerly.  "Do  you  think 
he  would  be  just  as  ready  to  do  it  as  he  was? 
Well,  do  you  think  he  will  be  just  as  ready  when 
you  want  him  to? — people's  ideas  change.  Why 
shouldn't  you  ask  him  now — why  not  make  use 
of  him  while  he's  here?" 

"We're  not  well  enough  known,"  said  Royce. 
"We  don't  want  to  have  a  theatre  for  three 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  197 

months — I  want  to  open  it,  and  keep  it  open. 
Besides,  it  wouldn't  be  a  fair  proposal  in  our 
present  position." 

"He  has  lots  to  lose,"  she  argued;  "it  wouldn't 
hurt  him  if  it  were  a  frost.  Which  house  should 
we  take?  Perhaps — perhaps  he'd  build  you  a 
theatre!  You're  very  stupid  to  take  it  so  easy, 
my  boy — when  you  want  him,  he  may  have  cooled 
off.  And  he  may  marry — men  are  such  mugs — I 
daresay  he'll  go  and  marry  and  want  all  his 
money  for  his  wife.  You  may  be  sure  there  are 
heaps  of  women  trying  for  him — he'll  fall  in  love 
directly." 

"He  was  engaged  in  New  York.  The  girl 
broke  it  off." 

"Broke  it  off?    The  girl  did?" 

"So  he  told  me." 

"Good  Lord !  Heaven  was  kind  to  us  to  make 
her  such  a  fool!" 

"Don't!"  said  Royce;  "I  think  he's  cut  up 
about  it." 

She  lifted  her  eyebrows  protestingly.  "I  hope 
he  understands  we  are  genuine,"  she  said,  "and 
won't  be  afraid  of  taking  us  by  surprise.  If  he 
doesn't  call  soon,  you  must  fix  a  day — or  I  shall. 
I  want  him  to  be  very  much  at  home  in  this  flat, 
I  can  tell  you;  he  means  our  future!" 

This  was  all  very  distasteful  to  Oliphant;  it 


198  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

jarred  upon  him  terribly,  but  to  say  so  would 
entail  another  altercation.  He  held  his  peace, 
and  let  the  subject  drop.  The  woman's  ardour 
was  chilled  by  the  coldness  of  its  reception.  She 
reflected  that  he  was  not  companionable.  How 
different  he  had  been  before  he  got  her!  She 
might  have  done  better  for  herself  even  if  Fair- 
bairn  did  start  them  in  a  theatre !  And  momen- 
tarily she  felt  that  he  never  would — Royce  was 
so  impossible!  Now  how  nice  the  hour  would 
have  been  if  he  had  been  sympathetic,  and  could 
have  shared  her  enthusiasm,  and  made  plans  with 
her  for  their  advancement!  That  would  have 
been  marriage.  She  could  understand  that  in  a 
marriage  like  that  a  girl  might  be  happy  although 
she  was  not  rich.  Royce  was  only  enthusiastic 
about  matters  that  didn't  concern  him;  what 
affair  was  it  of  his  whether  a  play  was  "litera- 
ture," or  whether  it  wasn't,  if  the  parts  were 
good,  and  it  caught  on?  He  was  a  dreamer. 
His  ideals  were  very  fine,  she  supposed ;  but  high 
ideals  were  a  dreadful  strain  to  live  with.  She 
did  not  ridicule  his  theories — she  knew  that  many 
dreary  subjects  were  deep  and  admirable — but 
the  proper  place  for  them  was  Exeter  Hall,  or 
the  Birkbeck  Institute,  or  somewhere;  she  could 
not  pretend  to  want  them  rammed  down  her 
throat  with  her  meals.    If  he  felt  aggrieved,  she 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  199 

couldn't  help  it — she  had  not  yawned  often,  and 
he  had  bored  her  to  death.  No,  Royce  was  un- 
practical— a  crank.  He  was — he  was —  She 
tapped  her  foot  restlessly,  and  shook  her  head 
to  herself  behind  The  Era.  She  had  blundered 
with  the  wrong  man ! 

The  following  day,  however,  she  had  another 
triumph.     A  fancy  fair  was  being  held  at  the 

Botanical  Gardens  for  the  benefit  of The 

visitors  were  not  quite  certain  what  it  was  to 
benefit ;  but  a  number  of  more  or  less  prominent 
actresses  had  given  their  services,  and  a  large 
contingent  of  the  gilded  youth  sped  to  Regent's 
Park  from  Clubland,  curious  to  see  Miss  this  and 
Miss  the  other  off  the  stage.  There  were  several 
Society  women  too,  being  charitable  in  elaborate 
toilettes,  and  it  was  possible  for  quite  inferior 
young  men  to  acquire  a  chance  to  win  a  tea-cosy, 
or  buy  a  baby's  comforter  from  a  lady  who  had 
a  title. 

Blanche  was  assisting  at  the  Burmah  Stall, 
captivating  in  a  frock  which  Oliphant  mentally 
described  as  "a  shower  of  lace  without  a  figure." 
When  he  j  oined  her  there,  he  found  her  radiant. 

"Oh,"  she  exclaimed,  "I've  been  talking  to 
Lady  Fleck,  and  she  wants  to  be  introduced  to 
you !  They  say  she  knows  everybody  in  the  pro- 
fession— the  authors  and  critics  and  everyone. 


200  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

She's  ever  so  gone  on  you — says  you're  the  com- 
ing man,  and  I  don't  know  what.  There  she  is! 
Come  over  now." 

Lady  Fleck  was  emerging  from  a  group  upon 
the  lawn,  smiling  vaguely.  As  she  saw  Oliphant 
and  Blanche  approaching,  her  smile  gained  ex- 
pectation. She  was  not  pretty  and  she  was  not 
young,  but  actors  and  authors  and  musicians 
found  her  charming — she  liked  them  so  much. 
She  gave  Sunday  luncheon  parties,  which  she 
called  "bohemian,"  and  which  sometimes  cost  two 
hundred  pounds. 

"I'm  so  delighted  to  meet  you,  Mr.  Oliphant," 
she  said;  "I've  been  telling  your  wife  how  I've 
looked  forward  to  knowing  you  both.  Such  an 
interesting  couple  I've  always  thought  you — so 
romantic!" 

The  last  word  completed  his  embarrassment; 
it  was  his  earliest  experience  of  social  adulation. 
Blanche  covered  his  awkwardness  by  the  playful 
assumption  of  a  shyness  that  she  did  not  feel. 

"Oh,  don't  say  that,  Lady  Fleck,"  she  cried, 
hiding  her  face  affectedly;  "you'll  make  us  so 
vain  of  each  other!" 

"But  I  must  say  it,"  declared  Lady  Fleck; 
"such  an  interesting  couple!  Oh,  your  Faust,  Mr. 
Oliphant!  it  impressed  me  so  deeply.  You  re- 
vealed  Faust   to   me.      How   you   must   have 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  201 

thought" — she  half  closed  her  eyes  to  convey 
thought — "how  you  must  have  lived  in  the  char- 
acter to  portray  it  as  you  do!" 

"I'm  glad  it  pleased  you,"  he  murmured. 

"Of  course  I'm  an  enthusiast  about  the  Stage, 
I  confess  it !  My  passion  is  the  Theatre.  When 
I  see  a  performance  like  yours,  I  want  to  thank 
the  actor — I  want  to  go  to  him — to  tell  him  what 
I  owe  him  for  the  intellectual  and  emotional  treat 
he  has  given  me!" 

He  contrived  a  response  with  great  labour. 
She  discovered  it  to  be  "so  original,  so  sugges- 
tive." Blanche  felt  rather  in  the  way,  but  hesi- 
tated to  make  an  excuse  and  vanish,  not  knowing 
whether  a  lady  in  Society  would  consider  it  tact- 
ful or  rude.  She  was  relieved  when  they  were 
interrupted.  Lady  Fleck  pressed  them  to  go 
to  see  her,  and  repeated  her  "day"  twice,  with 
much  warmth. 

In  the  bedroom  that  night  Royce  was  entreated 
to  realise  the  responsibility  that  rested  on  him. 

"You  must  make  the  most  of  this  chance," 
insisted  the  girl;  "say  things  when  we  go!  If 
she  takes  us  up,  we  shall  meet  no  end  of  people. 
And  gaze  at  her  as  if  you  thought  she  was  good- 
looking — that's  more  important  than  all;  she 
knows  already  you're  clever.  I  know  what 
women  are — you  re  the  draw  with  Lady  Fleck, 


202  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

because  you're  a  man.  It  wouldn't  hurt" — she 
raised  her  bare  foot  contemplatively  and  admired 
it,  as  she  always  did  when  she  undressed — "it 
wouldn't  hurt  if  you  make  up  to  her  a  little.  Not 
ridiculously,  because  her  husband  mightn't  like 
it,  and  then  we  shouldn't  be  asked  any  more ;  but 
plain  women  are  so  easily  flattered,  dear  boy — 
Gertrude  smirked  in  the  Zoo  when  a  monkey 
looked  after  her — you  needn't  go  far.  ...  Do 
baronets'  wives  know  duchesses?" 


CHAPTER  XIV 

If  their  marriage  had  sprung  from  love  instead 
of  from  infatuation — even  if  one  of  them  had  ever 
truly  loved  the  other — their  life  would  have  been 
very  enviable.  The  child  was  born  early  in  De- 
cember, and  at  the  end  of  February  Blanche  was 
fulfilling  another  engagement  in  town,  and  at  the 
Pantheon  Oliphant  had  won  approval  as  Mer- 
cutio.  They  were  young,  the  man  had  had  great 
luck,  and  they  were  in  a  profession  which  pays 
the  fortunate  lavishly  while  making  small  de- 
mand upon  their  time.  It  is  true  that  every  day 
Oliphant  studied — shutting  himself  in  a  room 
and  striving  to  attain  the  control  over  the  muscles 
of  his  face  that  a  musician  seeks  over  his  instru- 
ment ;  taking  his  voice  note  by  note,  and  practis- 
ing with  it  as  a  singer  practises  his  scales — but 
this  was  only  in  the  morning,  and  by  no  means 
during  the  entire  morning.  He  did  not  work 
for  hours  at  a  stretch  as  do  authors,  painters,  civil 
engineers,  city  clerks,  and  other  men.  He  was 
free  to  go  out  with  his  wife  whenever  she  wished 

203 


204  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

him  to  do  so ;  and  although  she  had  met  far  fewer 
titles  at  Lady  Fleck's  than  she  had  expected, 
there  were,  by  the  summer,  several  "Tuesdays" 
and  "Thursdays"  on  which  she  claimed  his  com- 
pany. 

She  did  not  disguise  that  she  was  very  am- 
bitious of  extending  their  circle  of  people  worth 
knowing;  by  "people  worth  knowing"  she  already 
meant  people  in  Society.  Scheming  to  extend  it, 
she  never  missed  an  opportunity  of  being  agree- 
able to  her  own  sex ;  men  only  paid  compliments, 
she  realised — it  was  to  women  she  must  look  for 
the  magic  words  "I  shall  be  so  pleased  if  you'll 
come  and  see  me."  From  this  cause  she  accepted 
the  former's  attentions  with  such  composure  that 
she  was  pronounced  by  masculine  admirers  to 
be  "a  bit  cold,  don't  you  know,"  and  gained 
among  women — to  whom  she  listened  with  an  air 
of  enchained  interest — the  reputation  of  being 
devoted  to  her  husband.  To  a  "romantic  couple" 
in  the  most  popular  profession  an  invitation  to 
one  house  led  to  the  drawing-room  of  another 
if  tact  and  patience  were  employed. 

Otho  Fairbairn  also  had  his  social  uses,  though 
as  a  bachelor  they  were  limited.  He  had  not 
become  quite  the  constant  visitor  that  Blanche 
had  hoped  to  see  him;  still  he  would  drop  in  upon 
them  sometimes  at  odd  hours  now,  and  she  had 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  205 

made  herself  very  sympathetic  in  a  tete-a-tete 
once  on  the  subject  of  his  misogyny.  Otho  had 
found  it  a  pleasant  matter  to  discuss  with  her. 
She  had  assured  him  that  he  was  only  temporarily 
embittered,  and  prophesied  that  some  day  he 
would  come  across  a  pretty  girl  who  would  com- 
pletely change  his  views.  He  denied  the  possi- 
bility. Between  his  heart  and  him  the  Atlantic 
rolled.  Nevertheless  the  conversation  had  a 
charm,  and  he  was  more  than  ever  of  the  opinion 
that  Royce  had  married  a  very  nice  woman. 

The  year  for  which  the  flat  had  been  obtained 
had  expired,  and  Oliphant  and  she  had  just  taken 
one  a  shade  more  commodious,  on  the  same  side 
of  the  street.  Since  the  advent  of  the  baby  and 
a  nurse  their  recent  quarters  had  been  rather 
inconvenient.  Now  that  the  child  was  here,  and 
could  be  brought  to  her  arms  in  white  embroidery, 
and  carried  away  if  he  cried  obstreperously, 
Blanche  showed  an  interest  in  the  little  being — 
even  in  moments  displayed  tenderness  for  him. 
He  had  been  christened  Hugh,  the  name  that 
had  been  Royce's  father's.  Oliphant,  still  half- 
frightened  of  breaking  him  if  he  picked  him  up, 
loved  to  sit  and  look  at  the  mite.  He  did  not 
remember  looking  at  a  baby  before,  and  the  help- 
lessness of  this  tiny  thing  that  was  his  son  awoke 
extraordinary  emotions  in  him.     If  Blanche's 


206  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

tenderness  had  not  been  capricious,  if  her  interest 
in  the  undesired  child  had  been  more  than  a 
liking,  there  would  now  have  been  a  firm  link 
between  him  and  her. 

Excepting  during  the  few  weeks  in  the  pre- 
vious autumn  when  he  had  toured  with  the  Pan- 
theon company,  they  had  not  been  separated 
since  their  wedding.  They  had,  however,  never 
played  on  the  same  stage  since  then.  Each  had 
a  nightly  world  apart  from  the  other.  The  fact 
to  a  well-mated  pair  might  have  furnished  food 
for  cheerful  chatter  across  the  supper-table,  but 
only  to  a  pair  very  happily  mated  indeed.  Gossip 
about  those  who  are  strangers  to  the  listener  is 
rarely  amusing,  and  it  sounds  dull  to  the  one 
who  gossips  also.  The  listener  generally  says 
the  wrong  thing,  and  the  anecdote  falls  flat.  Oli- 
phant  and  his  wife  rarely  touched  upon  the  inci- 
dents of  the  evening  to  each  other. 

While  Royce  remained  at  the  Pantheon  there 
was  no  prospect  of  a  joint  engagement.  Even 
when  he  was  wanted  for  a  matinee  at  the  Mirror, 
he  knew  nothing  about  it  until  the  women's  parts 
were  cast.  Blanche  had  asked  him  to  ascertain 
if  there  was  a  chance  for  her  there,  and  he  re- 
turned with  the  news  that  all  the  arrangements 
were  made. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  207 

"How  about  youV  she  inquired.  "Has 
Greatorex  given  you  permission?" 

"Yes,  that's  all  right.  I  spoke  to  hirn  last 
night.  What  are  those — the  proofs  of  your  like- 
nesses?   Let  me  look." 

She  gave  them  to  him  one  by  one,  scrutinising 
them  herself  across  his  shoulder.  She  had  a 
passion  for  having  her  likeness  taken,  and,  not 
having  arrived  at  the  position  where  photogra- 
phers wrote  offering  sittings  for  nothing,  she 
spent  a  good  deal  of  money  upon  it,  although,  of 
course,  she  obtained  the  "professional  reduction." 
There  were  here  various  presentments  of  her: 
she  stood  triumphant,  showing  her  bosom  and  her 
teeth;  she  sat  thinking  high  thoughts,  with  her 
cheek  upon  her  hand;  she  had  her  face  in  profile 
and  her  hands  behind  her  back;  and  her  hands 
full  of  flowers  and  her  face  bent.  She  laughed; 
she  mused;  she  yearned — she  was  beautiful  in 
all  of  them;  and  her  husband's  paramount  reflec- 
tion was  how  little  they  resembled  her. 

"Which  do  you  think  is  best?"  she  said. 

"They're  all  exquisite ;  I  don't  know.  Perhaps 
this  .  .  .  but  it's  so  difficult  to  say." 

"The  'soulful'  one — I  think  I  like  that  best 
myself.  You  know  it  ought  to  sell,  that — I  do 
want  an  agent  who  would  push  me  on;  I  wish 
I  could  get  hold  of  Bernstein ! — What  do  I  look 


208  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

as  if  I'm  thinking  about?"  She  held  the  photo- 
graph out,  and  viewed  it  critically.  "Now  sup- 
pose you'd  never  spoken  to  me — suppose  you 
were  somebody  else  and  saw  it  in  the  shop- 
windows — what  would  you  think  I  was  like?" 

"My  dear  girl,"  said  Oliphant,  checking  a  sigh, 
"I  can't  imagine!" 

"Well,  you'd  be  curious  to  know  me,  wouldn't 
you?  It  would  stand  out  among  the  other 
women's?  Wouldn't  it — isn't  it  uncommon? 
What  do  you  say?  Or  do  you  think  there's  too 
much  shadow  about  it?  What  does  it  suggest — 
what  kind  of  girl?  I  meant  to  look  all  aspiration 
and  religion  in  this;  very  Bible-y!  as  if  my  eyes 
were  fixed  on  Heaven.  You  know  what  I  mean. 
I  think  I  shall  have  a  dozen  of  this,  and  a  dozen 
of  the  one  in  the  low-neck,  and  ...  I  don't 
know  that  any  of  them  are  really  very  good — I 
don't  look  my  best.  The  one  with  the  hat  on 
is  a  perfect  beast!  .  .  .  No,  he  must  give  me 
another  sitting.  Don't  tell  'em  at  home  I'm 
having  any  done — I  want  to  save  them  for  par- 
ticular people." 

"Where's  Baby?"  asked  Oliphant.  "Is  he  out 
still?" 

"No,  it's  in  the  nursery,"  she  said,  disposing 
the  mounted  proofs  in  a  line  along  the  mantel- 
piece; "do  you  want  it  in?" 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  209 

"I  may  as  well  go  to  him,  if  he's  awake." 
"It  was  awake  just  now — I  heard  it  crying." 
"Well,  I'll  go  and  say  'How  d'ye  do'  to  him 
in  his  own  domain." 

The  nurse  said  she  had  "never  seen  a  gentle- 
man take  such  notice  of  his  baby  as  Mr.  Oli- 
phant."  He  inquired  if  the  eyes  were  likely  to 
remain  that  glorious  blue ;  was  despondent  when 
he  heard  that  "  'most  every  baby  was  born  with 
blue  eyes";  and  knew  restored  hope  when  she 
added  that,  "as  Madam's  eyes  was  blue,  there  was 
no  saying  but  what  they  might."  It  pleased  him 
to  imagine  that  the  infant  looked  at  him  with 
a  different  expression  from  that  awakened  by 
others;  and  because  he  felt  embarrassed  under 
the  nurse's  surveillance,  he  was  always  glad  when 
she  withdrew,  leaving  him  at  liberty  to  behave 
as  ridiculously  as  he  pleased.  How  he  wished 
that  "Hugh"  could  talk  already,  and  that  he 
could  take  him  out,  holding  his  warm  little  hand, 
and  dazzle  him  with  toys!  How  funny  and  jolly 
it  would  be !  .  .  .  And  unless  he  had  all  his  own 
feeling  for  the  art,  he  should  never  be  an  actor. 
Oh  no!  he  should  be  a  doctor,  or  go  to  the  Bar. 
And — he  shouldn't  take  a  wife  until  he  was  quite, 
quite  sure.  Poor  little  Hugh — the  nurse  had 
withdrawn,  and  he  touched  the  baby's  face  with 
his  own.     If  only  his  father  could  have  lived  to 


210  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

see  Hugh!  .  .  .  He  wondered  if  he  knew  about 
him  now.  It  was  an  awful  thing,  poor  little 
Hugh,  to  choose  the  wrong  girl.  O  God,  grant 
that  the  child  would  find  nothing  lacking  in 
Blanche! — how  piteous  if  he  couldn't  love  her, 
either ! 

The  matinee  for  which  Oliphant's  services  had 
been  sought  was  designed  to  introduce  the  first 
dramatic  experiment  of  a  novelist  of  the  intro- 
spective school.  For  a  reason  that  was  not 
known  he  awaited  the  verdict  on  his  earliest  play 
with  deep  anxiety.  When  he  had  married,  a  year 
or  two  before,  his  mother  had  been  very  indig- 
nant. Some  mothers  do  consider  matrimony  the 
one  unpardonable  offence  that  their  sons  can 
commit.  The  indignation  of  the  novelist's 
mother,  however,  had  placed  him  in  a  peculiar 
predicament;  the  first  time  after  his  marriage 
that  he  drew  an  unlovable  woman,  she  called  on 
all  their  friends,  and  said  that  "Arthur  had  dis- 
covered his  wife's  real  character  at  last!"  And 
when,  in  his  next  book,  he  drew  the  failings  of 
a  totally  different  woman,  she  exclaimed  that 
"poor  Arthur  was  finding  out  more  about  his 
wife  every  day!"  As  a  consequence  he  was  terri- 
fied to  describe  any  woman  who  wasn't  a  born 
angel,  and  his  career  in  fiction  seemed  over. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  211 

He  read  a  play  as  badly  as  most  novices,  and 
resembled  dramatists  more  eminent  by  cherishing 
the  delusion  that  few  persons  read  one  so  well. 
Oliphant  received  his  part  the  day  before  the 
reading  was  to  take  place,  and  to  a  cursory 
perusal  it  looked  promising :  some  of  the  speeches 
a  little  long  perhaps;  here  and  there  a  line  that 
"didn't  speak" — awkward  when  one  came  to 
utter  it;  but  the  man  seemed  alive,  he  evidently 
meant  something.  To  an  admirer  of  the  author's 
novels  the  production  of  the  drama  was  an  inter- 
esting experiment. 

Arthur  Mundey  was  on  the  stage,  and  made 
himself  known,  when  Oliphant  reached  the 
Mirror.  He  said  he  was  glad  that  it  had  proved 
possible  to  obtain  Mr.  Oliphant  for  the  pro- 
tagonist, and  the  actor  was  gratified.  Whatever 
significance  the  public  might  attach  to  the 
matinee,  it  was  to  the  organisers  decidedly  im- 
portant— the  outcome  of  a  movement  with  which 
he  was  in  cordial  sympathy.  The  company  had 
not  all  arrived,  and  as  he  lounged  under  the 
T-piece  his  gaze  met  a  face  that  was  familiar, 
though  he  did  not  instantaneously  remember  how 
he  knew  it.  The  woman,  who  was  seated  in  the 
prompt-entrance,  had  been  looking  towards  him 
at  the  same  moment,  and  he  saw  in  her  eyes  the 
diffident  expression  of  one  who  waits  to  be  recog* 


S12  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

nised.  Now,  her  identity  flashed  upon  him,  and 
he  went  to  her  quickly.  But  her  name  escaped 
him  still;  so  extending  his  hand,  and  in  a  tone 
of  pleasure  that  was  not  feigned,  he  exclaimed : 

"How  d'ye  do?    We  meet  again  at  last!" 

She  rose,  with  a  murmured  greeting.  "You 
didn't  expect  to  find  me  here,  Mr.  Oliphant?" 

"Indeed,  no;  I — I  didn't  know  who  was  in  it 
at  all.  Have  you  been  back  from  South  Africa 
long?" 

"I  came  back  in  January,"  she  said.  "I  saw 
you  looking  across — I  wondered  if  you'd  remem- 
ber me." 

"Of  course  I  do!"  The  name  touched  his 
tongue.  "I'm  very  glad  to  see  you  again,  Miss 
King.    What  are  you  playing — is  it  any  good?" 

"  'Patience  Banfield,'  "  she  said;  "it's  a  small 
character-part.  You — you  have  fulfilled  my 
prophecy,  Mr.  Oliphant — may  I  congratulate 
you?    I  was  at  the  Pantheon  last  night." 

Her  manner  was  graver  than  it  had  been,  he 
fancied.  He  recalled  a  girl,  and  here  she  was  a 
woman.  How  long  ago  was  it?  Two  years — 
two  years  and  a  half.  No  time!  But  what  a 
change  it  had  made  in  his  position! — Pathetic,  as 
he  stood  before  her,  that  she  had  not  risen  too. 
He  paused  with  a  little  embarrassment.  The 
questions  that  he  would  have  asked  were  impos- 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  213 

sible,  but  he  felt  that  he  was  appearing  formal, 
even  that  the  situation  imparted  to  him,  against 
his  will,  an  air  of  patronage.  He  was  distinctly 
relieved  when  Mundey  sat  down  at  the  table, 
and  they  had  to  listen  to  the  play. 

It  disappointed  him;  yet  how  clever  it  was! 
though  half  its  cleverness  was  missed  by  the 
assembly  to  whom  it  was  read.  It  was  a  novel 
in  dialogue.  It  would  have  been  admirable  under 
the  library  lamp,  but  the  flare  of  the  footlights 
would  kill  it.  It  was  delicate,  subtle,  undramatic 
— it  was  the  scenery  painted  by  an  Impressionist. 
A  great  regret  possessed  him  as  the  reading  went 
on,  Mundey  perspiring  and  growing  hoarse.  He 
felt  the  pity  of  it  that  a  fine  talent  should  be 
frustrated  by  an  unskilful  hand.  He  glanced 
round  as  much  of  the  semi-circle  as  was  within 
his  view — the  listless  heads,  the  disposal  of  the 
limbs,  signified  nothing  but  weariness.  Yes !  one 
face  spoke  the  emotion  that  stirred  himself — one 
woman  understood :  Miss  King  was  thinking  his 
own  thoughts. 

He  spoke  to  her  again  as  she  was  hastening 
up  the  steps,  after  a  few  insincere  compliments 
had  been  made  upon  the  work.  She  had  bowed, 
and  vanished,  but  he  had  overtaken  her.  That 
she  should  leave  without  saying  good-after- 
noon,   without    approaching    him,    revived    the 


214  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

mental  discomfort  he  had  experienced.  Circum- 
stances had  once  flung  them  into  an  intimate, 
if  short-lived,  friendship,  and  though  in  the 
interval  he  had  forgotten  all  about  her,  it  hurt 
him  to  see  that  she  felt  they  no  longer  met  upon 
terms  of  equality.  He  was  a  leading  man,  and 
she  remained  an  obscure  actress:  so  she  did  not 
speak  to  him  unless  she  was  addressed !  He  could 
not  bear  that — it  distressed  him. 

"You're  not  going  to  run  away  before  we've 
said  ten  words  to  each  other,  are  you?"  he  asked. 
"How  do  you  like  the  play?" 

"I "  she  hesitated.     "I  should  like  very 

much  to  read  it  quietly  by  myself.  Do  you  think 
it  will  succeed,  Mr.  Oliphant?" 

"I  think  my  opinion  of  it's  the  same  as  your 
own." 

"The  same  as  my  own?" 

"Yes;  I  saw  you  while  it  was  being  read." 

She  looked  surprised,  and  a  little  dismayed; 
"1  hope  Mundey  didn't  see!" 

"You  needn't  be  alarmed!  But  shall  I  tell 
you  what  you  thought?  You  thought  what  a 
good  novel  it  would  have  made." 

"That's  true,"  she  acknowledged;  "I  did." 
They  were  at  the  corner  of  the  street,  and  she 
stopped. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  215 

"Am  I  in  the  way?"  inquired  Oliphant.  "Do 
you  want  me  to  say  good-bye?" 

"Not  if  we're  going  the  same  road;  I  go 
through  Drury  Lane." 

"So  do  I,  if  you'll  let  me.  But  it  isn't  about 
the  play  I  want  to  talk  to  you;  I  want  to  hear 
about  yourself.  I  thought  perhaps  you'd  have 
written  to  me  after  you  went  to  the  Cape,  to  tell 
me  how  you  got  on.    Why  didn't  you?" 

"I  didn't  like  to,"  she  said.  "Did  it  look 
ungrateful?" 

1  'Ungrateful'?  What  on  earth  had  you  to 
be  grateful  for?  No;  but  I  should  have  been 
pleased  to  hear!  When  did  you  say  you  came 
back — in  January?" 

"I've  been  back  six  months.  It  was  a  very 
good  engagement,  in  a  sense — it  lasted  much 
longer  than  I  had  expected ;  I  was  out  there  two 
years.  I  didn't  look  forward  to  staying  anything 
like  that  time.  I  played  in  Cape  Town  and  Kim- 
berley  and  Johannesburg,  and  became  quite  an 
Afrikander." 

"Was  it  pleasant?" 

"I  don't  like  the  country.  The  Colony  and 
Johannesburg  aren't  so  bad,  but  Kimberley  is 
loathsome.  It's  none  of  it  very  agreeable,  though, 
after  the  novelty  wears  off;  and,  oh,  how  dear! 
One's  salary  goes  nowhere!    After  we  left  Cape 


216  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

Town  I  used  to  pay  a  shilling  for  The  Stage — 
when  I  bought  it." 

"I  suppose  that  wasn't  often?" 

She  laughed.  "There  were  weeks  when  I 
missed  it,  if  nobody  had  had  a  copy  from  home 
to  lend  me." 

"And  since  you  have  been  back?" 

"I've  been  on  tour  with  A  Lilac  Chain — not 
much  of  a  company,  of  course!  That's  what  1 
meant  when  I  said  it  was  a  good  engagement  'in 
a  sense' :  the  Cape  doesn't  lead  to  anything — I'm 
just  where  I  was  when  I  went  away.  You've 
been  marvellously  fortunate,  Mr.  Oliphant,  if  I 
may  say  so." 

"Oh,  please  don't  say  'if  you  may  say' ! — why 
shouldn't  you?  Of  course  I've  been  fortunate. 
Luck's  everything.  It  was  The  Impostor  that 
gave  me  my  opportunity,  you  know;  Rayne  had 
an  accident,  and  I  got  the  chance  to  play  lead 
in  town  by  accident.  But  for  that  I  daresay  I 
shouldn't  be  any  better  off  than  when  we  last 
met.  I  suppose  you  saw  that  The  Impostor  was 
produced  soon  after  you  left  England?" 

"Yes,  that  was  one  of  the  weeks  when  I  did 
see  a  paper — I  was  so  glad!  You  mustn't  say 
luck  is  everything,  though.  Luck  gave  you  your 
chance,  but  you  had  the  talent  to  make  use  of 
it.    I  never  thought,  when  you  told  me  the  plot 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  217 

of  your  drama  that  evening,  that  I  should  be 
reading  a  criticism  of  it  in  Cape  Town  two  or 
three  months  later — it  seemed  so  funny!  That 
was  when  I  was  really  tempted  to  write  to  you; 
but — oh,  I  don't  know  I — I  hadn't  done  it  when 
I  arrived;  and  so  to  write  to  you  when  you  had 
a  success  looked  as  if  it  would  be  rather  mean. 
I  thought  so,  anyhow.  Oh,  there's  one  thing  I 
want  to  say — it  isn't  of  engrossing  interest,  but 
I  should  like  you  to  know:  I  sent  the  woman  in 
Alfred  Place  her  money!" 

"She  deserved  never  to  get  it,"  said  Oliphant; 
"but  of  course  you  did!  Yes,  I  hoped  for  a 
line  from  you;  and  Mrs. — er — Tubbs — oh,  Mrs. 
Tubbs  mourned  for  you!  You've  no  idea  what 
an  impression  you  made  on  Mrs.  Tubbs.  She 
used  to  talk  about  you  daily." 

"I  know,"  said  Miss  King;  "so  she  tells  me. 
I'm  staying  with  her  now." 

Oliphant  wheeled  round  incredulously. 

"Really?  Do  you  mean  it?  She's  there  still, 
and  you're  staying  with  her?" 

"I  had  to  stay  somewhere,  and  I  thought  of 
her  at  once.  In  point  of  fact,"  she  added  medita- 
tively, "I  don't  fancy  Mrs.  Tubbs  is  quite  so 
cheap  as  she  was.    But  she's  just  as  nice." 

"How  odd  it  seems,"  he  said.  "And  is  the 
furniture  still  blue?    And  is  she  still  garrulous 


218  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

about  the  niece  who  was  in  the  'prerf  ession'  ?  Did 
she  mention  me?  She  hadn't  been  to  the  Pan- 
theon, I  suppose?" 

"She  hadn't  been  yet — no;  but  she  mentioned 
you  the  evening  I  arrived." 

"I  believe  Mrs.  Tubbs  always  took  an  interest 
in  me,"  he  said  warmly.  "I  hope  she  wasn't 
hurt  that  I  hadn't  sent  her  seats?  To  tell  you 
the  truth,  I  never  thought  about  it." 

"I  don't  think  she  was;  indeed,  I'm  sure  she 
wasn't." 

"What  did  she  say?" 

"I  could  tell  she  wasn't  hurt." 

"She  must  have  said  something?"  he  smiled. 

"Well,"  replied  Miss  King  with  a  glimmer  of 
amusement  in  her  eyes,  "she  said  she  hadn't  heard 
of  you  since  you  left  her  and  she  hoped  you  were 
alive." 

Their  gaze  met,  and  laughter  broke  from  them 
both.  "Thank  you,"  exclaimed  Oliphant,  "I 
deserved  it!  But  this  is  Fame!  I  am  Mercutio 
in  capital  letters  on  the  Pantheon  bills,  and  my 
old  landlady  doesn't  know  it  till  you  come  from 
South  Africa  to  tell  her."  It  occurred  to  him 
to  wonder  if  Miss  King  had  heard  of  his  mar- 
riage.  "You  haven't  congratulated  me,"  he  said. 

"Oh,  I  have!"  she  replied;  "in  the  theatre — 
*he  first  thing." 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  219 

"I  mean  about  something  else.  I'm  married 
now." 

"Married?"  she  echoed.  "Are  you?  ...  I 
don't  know  why  it  should  be  astonishing, 
but " 

"It's  perfectly  true." 

"Oh,  I  congratulate  you  ever  so  much,  of 
course.  I  knew  nothing  about  it.  I  don't  meet 
many  people — I'm  like  Mrs.  Tubbs,  you  see.  Is 
your  wife  on  the  stage?" 

"Yes,  I  married  Miss  Blanche  Ellerton.  We — 
we've  been  married  nearly  eighteen  months.  I'm 
a  husband  and  father ;  don't  I  look  more  impor- 
tant?" 

"I  attributed  it  to  other  causes,"  she  laughed; 
"now  it's  explained!" 

They  had  reached  New  Oxford  Street,  and  she 
paused  again,  and  extended  her  hand. 

"I'm  sure  I've  taken  you  miles  out  of  your 
way,"  she  said.  "By  the  bye,  what  time  is  the 
call  to-morrow,  did  you  notice?" 

"Twelve  o'clock.  Isn't  it  tea-time,  and 
mightn't  we  go  and  have  some  tea?" 

"Oh  no,  thanks,"  she  said,  "I  want  to  get 
home." 

"Or  chocolate? — I  can  recommend  the  choco- 
late.   We've  only  to  cross  the  road." 

"I'd  rather  not,  thank  you ;  Mrs.  Tubbs  would 


220  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

be  so  wounded  if  I  didn't  want  anything  when 
I  got  in!" 

"Answer  me  one  question,"  he  exclaimed;  "do 
you  have  tea  in  the  drawing-room,  or  the  dining- 


room 


"The  drawing-room,"  said  she  gaily;  "the  blue 
drawing-room.    Good-afternoon,  Mr.  Oliphant." 

"Good-afternoon,  Miss  King." 

He  retraced  his  steps  to  the  Strand,  and 
mentally  followed  hers.  "The  drawing-room" 
— how  vividly  he  saw  it ! — and  the  brown  tea-pot 
on  the  dilapidated  tray  hidden  by  a  soiled  table- 
napkin;  the  battered  cover  over  the  toast.  It 
had  been  pleasant! — after  all  it  had  been  pleas- 
ant! He  was  happy  then,  only  he  didn't  know 
it  .  .  .  happier  than  now. 


CHAPTER  XV 

When  the  dramatic  critics  say  that  a  part  is 
unworthy  of  an  actor's  abilities,  the  author  may 
not  be  gratified,  but  it  means  that  the  actor's 
spurs  are  securely  fixed.  Excepting  Oliphant, 
who  gained  a  little  kudos,  it  is  doubtful  if  Mun- 
dey's  drama  advanced  any  one  professionally. 
Oliphant  wondered  if  it  would  do  Miss  King  any 
good.  He  was  glad  to  see  that  several  of  the 
papers  mentioned  her  favourably,  though  her 
performance  did  not  receive  the  notices  that  he 
considered  it  deserved.  During  the  fortnight's 
rehearsals  he  had  had  several  conversations  with 
her  on  the  stage,  and  it  would  have  pleased  him 
very  much  indeed  if  the  little  part  of  "Patience 
Banfield"  had  proved  a  stepping-stone  to  higher 
things. 

He  had  watched  her  rehearsals  with  a  curiosity 
that  she  did  not  divine — he  was  prepared  to  be 
disappointed,  to  find  her  execution  fall  short  of 
her  conceptions;  but  at  least  she  had  not  fallen 
short  of  his.    She  was  artistic  to  the  finger-tips, 

221 


222  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

and  her  voice  was  delicious;  he  could  not  say 
what  she  would  do  with  such  characters  as  she 
aspired  to  play,  but  he  was  persuaded  that,  given 
the  opportunity,  she  would  at  all  events  get  on. 

Apparently  no  opportunity  presented  itself, 
for  when  he  met  her  in  Wellington  Street  one 
day  about  a  month  after  the  piece  had  been  pro- 
duced, she  told  him  that  she  was  "going  out"  with 
A  Lilac  Chain  again. 

He  had  not  known  how  much  he  had  hoped 
for  her  until  he  heard  it;  indeed,  he  was  more 
disappointed  than  she;  in  her,  expectation  had 
long  grown  faint. 

"I  wish,"  he  remarked  to  Blanche,  "I  could 
have  done  something  to  help  Miss  King." 

"Why?"  she  said. 

"I  like  her,  and  she's  clever.  I'd  have  been 
very  glad  to  do  her  a  service." 

"I  didn't  think  much  of  her  at  the  Mirror. 
What  have  you  seen  her  play  in  besides  Mundey's 
thing?" 

"Nothing  else.  But  she  was  admirable  in  that ; 
you  must  remember  there  was  no  scope  for  big 
effects." 

"I  thought  you  were  in  the  provinces  with  her 
once.    How  did  you  know  her  then?" 

"I  knew  her  in  London,"  he  answered;  "we 
stayed  in  the  same  lodgings  for  a  week  or  two." 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  223 

Blanche  yawned,  and  he  was  relieved  that  she 
did  not  pursue  the  subject.  It  would  hardly  be 
fair,  he  thought,  to  explain  the  circumstances 
that  had  led  to  their  being  in  the  same  lodgings. 
It  was  a  story  that  might  be  misconstrued,  espe- 
cially by  a  woman  like  his  wife. 

Yes,  he  was  sorry  he  had  no  influence  to  assist 
Miss  King.  He  did  like  her.  He  wished,  for  her 
sake,  that  she  were  settled  in  town;  and  for  his 
own,  he  wished  that  she  and  Blanche  were  friends. 
She  would  have  been  a  visitor  who  interested  him. 
It  would  have  been  an  agreeable,  a  stimulating 
afternoon,  when  she  called — it  would  have  taken 
him  out  of  himself  for  an  hour;  or,  more  pre- 
cisely, he  could  have  been  himself.  Then  the 
momentary  reflection  caused  him  to  perceive  how 
improbable  it  was  that  Blanche  and  she  would 
attract  each  other;  they  were  so  unlike — he  did 
not  think  two  women  could  be  more  dissimilar. 
Everything  in  Blanche  that  jarred  upon  him 
would  jar  upon  Miss  King.  .  .  .  Yes,  that  was 
a  fact!  It  hadn't  occurred  to  him  before,  but — 
but  it  was  true. 

Greatorex  was  about  to  begin  his  customary 
tour,  and  on  his  return  to  the  Pantheon  the 
revival  of  Romeo  and  Juliet  would  be  resumed. 
Enormously  successful  as  this  had  been,  though, 
it  could  not  continue  much  longer,  and  Oliphant 


224s  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

was  again  constrained  to  wonder  if  his  engage- 
ment was  drawing  to  a  close.  For  Mercutio,  as 
for  Faust,  he  had  been  engaged  only  for  the  "run 
of  the  piece."  If  he  were  offered  a  second  re- 
engagement,  he  might  reasonably  expect  to 
obtain  a  second  increase  of  terms,  but  as  he  and 
Blanche  were  already  living  quite  as  luxuriously 
as  he  desired,  he  wasn't  eager  for  a  higher  salary ; 
he  was  inclined  to  wish  that  he  had  had  a  three- 
years  contract  for  a  fixed  sum,  so  that  he  could 
have  felt  calmly  confident  of  remaining  at  the 
house  until  a  distant  date. 

Blanche  did  not  accompany  her  husband  on 
tour.  Last  summer  she  had  not  been  well  enough 
to  do  so,  and  now  to  undertake  a  railway  j  ourney 
every  week  with  a  baby  and  a  nurse  would  have 
been  absurd.  She  had  talked  of  taking  them  to 
Eastbourne  during  his  absence,  for  she  could  not 
look  forward  to  acting  again  until  theatrical 
London  woke  to  activity  in  the  autumn. 

This  year  the  company's  "dates"  included 
Brighton.  It  was  the  last  place  they  visited,  and 
they  arrived  after  the  August  heat  had  subsided 
and  the  season  had  begun.  As  the  cab  rattled 
Oliphant  past  a  hoarding  on  the  way  to  his  apart- 
ments, he  caught  sight  of  the  title  A  Lilac  Chain 
on  a  poster  of  one  of  the  two  lesser  theatres ;  and, 
fresh  from  the  bill-sticker's  brush,  the  advertise- 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  225 

ment  was  pleasant  to  him  on  entering  the  town. 
So  Miss  King  was  here!  He  hoped  he'd  meet 
her. 

The  hope  was  fulfilled  on  the  next  morning 
but  one.  He  did  not  admit  to  himself  that  he 
was  pacing  the  front  after  he  was  tired  of  it,  but 
he  was  feeling  dejected  when  they  came  face  to 
face  at  last. 

Naturally  she  was  not  surprised ;  everybody  at 
Brighton  was  aware  that  Greatorex  was  at  the 
Royal. 

"Of  course  you  know  you're  an  enemy?"  she 
said,  smiling.  "The  Pantheon  company  is  ruin- 
ing our  business  here ;  if  I  weren't  a  traitress  to 
my  manager,  I  shouldn't  talk  to  you." 

"Oh,  please  be  a  traitress,"  he  said.  "I  won- 
dered if  I  should  come  across  you.  Are  you 
really  doing  badly?" 

"Well,  it's  not  one  of  the  things  one  is  sup- 
posed to  confess,  but  I  don't  think  we're  turning 
money  away.  Where  do  you  go  next  week? 
You're  not  against  us  again?" 

"We  go  back  to  London.    And  you?" 

"Oh,  nothing  so  distinguished — we've  a  dread- 
ful j  ourney  to  Plymouth.  How  is  the  baby — and 
your  wife?" 

"They're  very  well,"  he  said,  "thanks.  I  should 
like  you  to  meet  my  wife  one  day.    She's  in  town 


226  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

now,  or  I'd  ask  you  if  we  might  call  on  you. 
What  is  your  part  like  in  this?  I  looked  to  see 
if  you  had  a  Wednesday  matinee — if  you  had,  I 
should  come." 

"My  part  is  very  good — it  always  is — in  the 
provinces  or  South  Africa,  where  it  doesn't  ad- 
vance me.  When  I  say  'good,'  please  understand 
that  I'm  speaking  strictly  as  an  actress;  I  don't 
mean  that  it  has  anything  in  it :  I  mean  that  I've 
situations,  and  plenty  to  say." 

"You  ask  for  too  much,"  he  answered  with  a 
smile. 

"Because  I  want  to  succeed?" 

"Oh  no ;  because  you're  not  satisfied  with  situa- 
tions and  plenty  to  say." 

"That's  true,"  she  said,  "although  you  didn't 
mean  it.  I  do  ask  for  too  much — perhaps  that's 
why  I  get  so  little.    It's  hard,  though,  when  you 

feel  yourself  capable  of Oh,  how  terrible 

that  sounds!  I  don't  think  I'm  a  vain  woman, 
but  if  I'd  gone  on  then,  I  should  have  horrified 
you." 

He  shook  his  head.  "I  don't  think  you 
would.  If  I  were  a  dramatist  I  should  want  you 
in  my  cast.  I  don't  know  what  you'd  be  like 
as  Lady  Macbeth " 

"7  know,"  she  said;  "I  should  be  shocking." 

"But  I  can  see  you  in  some  parts.    If  Mundey 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  227 

had  been  a  personage  in  the  theatre,  even 
'Patience'  would  have  proved  useful  to  you:  he 
thought  you  excellent.  It  was  your  misfortune 
that  you  were  in  a  piece  by  a  man  who  may  never 
write  another." 

She  did  not  make  it  easy  for  him  to  turn  beside 
her,  and  after  a  few  more  seconds  he  took  his 
leave.  He  trusted,  however,  that  the  morrow 
would  be  fine.    And  it  was. 

He  chose  the  King's  Road  again,  but  it  proved 
a  disappointment.  A  board  proclaiming  at  the 
entrance  that  the  "band  was  now  playing"  sug- 
gested that  she  might  be  met  on  the  pier,  but 
here  also  he  failed;  and,  discarding  the  shops  as 
improbable,  since  she  was  only  in  a  watering- 
place  for  a  week,  he  sauntered  next  along  the 
sea-wall. 

It  was  on  the  sea-wall,  on  a  bench  with  a  book, 
that  he  discovered  her,  and  now  their  conversa- 
tion was  wider,  more  inspiriting.  This  was  on 
Wednesday;  and  on  Thursday  he  reached  the 
sea-wall  earlier. 

In  conversation  the  added  gravity  in  her 
demeanour  that  had  struck  him  when  he  saw  her 
on  the  Mirror  stage,  often  fell  from  her.  Her 
enthusiasm  for  something  beautiful  would 
brighten  her  face,  and  the  man's  mood.  She 
understood   so   quickly — and   she   was   so   well 


228  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

worth  understanding.  Their  ideas  were  not 
always  the  same,  but  it  was  an  unfamiliar  joy- 
to  him  to  find  himself  uttering  his  thoughts  with- 
out the  sharp  fear  of  their  exciting  ridicule  acting 
as  a  brake.  Even  when  Miss  King  took  a  differ- 
ent view  from  his,  they  thought  so  much  alike 
essentially,  that  their  arguments,  like  the  sides 
of  a  triangle,  always  met  at  the  apex,  and  their 
point  was  one  after  all. 

On  Friday  she  was  not  there.  But  when  he 
tried  the  pier  once  more  she  was  among  a  group 
that  watched  the  departure  of  the  Worthing  boat. 

As  he  recognised  his  liking  for  her,  it  was 
platonic.  If  he  had  been  told  that  in  seeking 
her  he  was  committing  an  indiscretion,  he  would 
have  laughed  at  the  statement  quite  honestly. 
It  was  she  who  realised  that  for  them  to  spend 
the  morning  together  every  day  was  inadvisable, 
though  her  reason  was  merely  that  his  wife  might 
not  like  it.  However,  now  that  he  was  here,  it 
would  have  been  self-conscious  to  hurry  away, 
and  he  appealed  to  her  sufficiently  for  her  re- 
straint to  vanish  ten  minutes  after  they  sat 
down. 

He  had  appealed  to  her  always,  and  at  the 
Cape  she  had  often  looked  back  on  their  acquaint- 
ance. No  doubt  it  remained  fresh  in  her  memory 
chiefly  because  it  had  been  attributable  to  an 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  229 

occurrence  which  no  woman  could  ever  forget; 
but  the  man's  personality  had  had  something  to 
do  with  the  fact  as  well.  In  retrospection,  too. 
she  perceived  much  that  she  had  ignored,  or 
taken  for  granted,  at  the  time,  and  she  told  her- 
self that  there  were  few  men  who  would  have 
proved  so  chivalrous  to  a  girl  under  such  condi- 
tions. It  was  natural  that  these  should  appear 
more  appalling  to  her  on  every  occasion  that  she 
dwelt  upon  them;  and  the  more  she  shuddered 
at  the  danger  that  she  had  run,  the  more  ex- 
aggerated was  the  tribute  that  she  paid  to  her 
companion's  loyalty. 

"What  train  do  you  go  by  on  Sunday?"  she 
asked.  "How  glad  you  must  be  that  you'll  soon 
be  home." 

"We  go  in  the  morning;  I  don't  know  by  which 
train.  Oh  yes,  of  course,  it  will  be  very  nice  to 
be  at  home."  He  felt  that  his  tone  had  had  less 
warmth  than  he  had  tried  to  throw  into  it,  and 
so  did  she;  it  was  a  surprise,  and  something  of 
a  shock  to  her.  He  added  quickly :  "Fortunately, 
my  wife  isn't  playing  now,  or  I  should  find  the 
evenings  rather  dull  till  we  reopen." 

"Isn't  it  wonderful  to  you  sometimes,"  said 
Miss  King,  "to  reflect  that  you're  Mercutio  at 
the  Pantheon?" 

"Don't  think  I'm  ungrateful;  but  it  isn't,  any 


230  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

longer.    I  only  wonder  that  I  don't  find  it  won 
derful." 

"But  that's  pathetic,"  she  said;  "I  shouldn't 
like  that.  Do  you  mean  to  say  that  the  pleasure 
of  success  is  so  very  fleeting,  that  you,  who  not 
three  years  ago  were — may  I  say  it? — who  not 
three  years  ago  were  quite  unknown  in  London, 
and  spoke  of  pawning  your  watch,  are  blase 
already?" 

"I  did  pawn  it,"  said  Oliphant.  "I  don't  like 
the  word  blase;  it  always  sounds  a  pose  to  me; 
but  it's  true  that  I  haven't  the  thrill,  the  ecstasy 
that  I  always  imagined  I  should  have,  presuming 
I  ever  got  so  far.  You  were  stage  struck  before 
you  went  into  the  profession,  of  course?" 

"Violently;  I  used  to  tremble  at  the  sight  of  a 
playbill.    Why?" 

"Well,  after  you  had  been  acting  for  a  year, 
didn't  you  ever  stand  on  a  stage  just  before  the 
curtain  went  up,  dismayed  to  find  yourself  so 
cool?  Didn't  you  ever  think:  'I  am  an  actress; 
I  am  standing  here  on  a  real  stage,  behind  a  real 
curtain,  and  there's  a  real  audience  on  the  other 
side  of  it  who'll  hear  me  speak  my  six  lines  in  a 
minute  or  two'?  Didn't  you  try  to  work  your- 
self up  into  the  state  of  tremor  that  you  were 
astonished  that  you  didn't  feel?" 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  231 

She  nodded.  "Often!  It's  just  what  I  did 
do." 

"Well,  it's  just  the  same  when  one  gets  further. 
I  say,  'How  rapturous  it  ought  to  be!'  " 

"It's  not  a  fair  comparison,"  she  said  earnestly; 
"that's  wrong,  it's  wicked  of  you.  Do  you  know 
what  that  will  mean  if  you  aren't  careful? — it 
will  mean  that  you'll  lose  your  ambition.  Don't 
do  that.  You  won't — because  we  both  love  the 
stage,  and  it  needs  ideals — you  won't  be  false  to 
that  dream  of  yours?" 

"Why,"  he  cried,  "didn't  we  talk  of  it  yester- 
day?   You  forget." 

"I  missed  something  yesterday,"  she  said;  "I 
don't  forget.  I  remember  how  you  talked  that 
day  outside  the  Museum,  and  you  didn't  sound 
quite  so  fervid  yesterday." 

Oliphant  sighed.  He  had  not  married  Blanche 
when  he  dreamed  outside  the  Museum.  Dulling 
his  aspiration  now  was  the  vague  consciousness 
that  he  was  picturing  a  future  which  his  wife 
would  depreciate  were  it  gained. 

"I  am  as  fervid  in  my  heart,"  he  said,  "God 
knows.  In  my  heart  the  stage  is  as  dear  to  me, 
my  aims  are  as  high,  as  before  you  and  I  ever 
met — as  high  as  when  I  was  at  the  Varsity  seeing 
visions,  and  worshipping  a  stage  that  doesn't 
live." 


232  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"I'm  glad,"  she  said.  "I'm  nobody;  and  when 
your  theatre  exists  I  shall  be  too  old  to  begin 
to  make  a  reputation  in  London,  and  too  sad  to 
go  there  only  to  make  a  living.  But  all  for  our 
stage,  and  not  for  myself,  I  should  like  to  see 
you,  who  have  the  talent  and  the  chance,  keep 
brave  enough  to  make  your  dream  come  true. 
Remember  that  a  man  is  young  as  long  as  he 
retains  his  enthusiasm;  you  have  such  time  in 
front  of  you — use  it  for  all  it's  worth!  Your 
opportunities  are  so  splendid — don't  waste  them. 
Accomplish,  Mr.  Oliphant.  Think  what  you've 
done,  and  strain  every  nerve  till  you've  done  all 
you  meant  to  do." 

The  band  had  finished,  and  the  crowd  was 
streaming  towards  the  turnstiles.  Miss  King 
rose,  and  he  sauntered  beside  her  to  the  Parade. 
Here  they  were  about  to  separate,  for  their  lodg- 
ings lay  in  opposite  directions,  but  as  they  loi- 
tered to  a  standstill  Oliphant  was  greeted  by  the 
actor  who  played  the  part  of  Friar  Laurence. 
The  Friar  told  him  that  a  telegram  for  him  was 
lying  at  the  theatre,  and  having  dropped  the 
information,  continued  his  way,  which  was  to  the 
Bodega.  When  Oliphant  rejoined  her,  Alma 
saw  that  he  had  turned  pale. 

"Is  anything  the  matter?" 

"He  says  there's  a  wire  for  me  at  the  theatre; 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  233 

it  can  only  be  from  home — I'm  afraid  the  baby 
may  be  ill." 

"Oh,"  she  faltered,  "why  imagine  such  a 
thing?"  She  looked  away,  with  a  pang  at  her 
heart — she  had  now  learned  almost  as  much  of 
his  married  life  as  he  could  have  told  her. 

"The  Royal  is  on  your  road,  isn't  it?  Do  you 
mind  driving?"  He  hailed  an  open  fly  at  the 
same  moment,  and  she  got  in. 

"You're  very  foolish  to  be  frightened,"  she 
said,  as  he  took  his  seat;  "surely  there  may  be 
a  dozen  reasons  why  your  wife  should  wire  you? 
Mightn't  it  be  business?" 

"I  daresay — I  don't  know.  I  suppose  it's 
foolish,  but  she  has  never  wired  me  before ;  it  was 
the  first  thing  I  thought  of."  It  was  only  now 
that  it  occurred  to  him  that  it  might  be  Blanche 
who  was  ill.  "Of  course  she  may  be  ill  herself," 
he  muttered.  "Or — or  it  may  be  nothing  at 
all." 

She  saw  that  the  kindest  thing  she  could  do 
was  to  be  silent;  and  they  did  not  speak  until 
the  stage-door  was  reached. 

"Don't  stop  inside!"  she  said. 

The  door  swung  to  behind  him,  and  she  sat 
watching  it. 

Oliphant  tore  the  telegram  open  in  the  pas- 
sage.   There  was  no  shock,  only  a  confirmation 


234  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

of  his  groundless  terror.  The  message  ran: 
"Baby  ill ;  I  think  you  ought  to  come  up  quickly." 
He  put  his  hand  over  his  eyes.  "Quickly?"  But 
he  must  play  Mercutio  first!  And  meanwhile 
the  child  might  die. 

He  walked  back  to  the  cab,  and  held  the  tele- 
gram out.  He  did  not  look  at  her  as  she  read 
it — he  was  looking  at  nothing  up  the  street.  The 
pause  in  which  her  sympathy  sought  for  words 
seemed  to  the  woman  to  last  a  long  time. 

"Is  it  strange  for  a  man  to  care  so  much  for 
a  little  baby?"  he  asked  huskily. 

"What  can  I  say  to  you?"  she  murmured,  in 
a  voice  that  expressed  everything.  "You  can 
be  there  to-night?  Oh,  of  course — Mercutio  has 
finished  so  early!    What  train  can  you  catch?" 

"I    don't    know — I    must    find    out.      Don't 

trouble;  it's  awfully  good  of  you,  but I'm 

very  fond  of  him,  you  see,  and  of  course  I'm 
worried.    I'll  go  and  look  at  a  time-table." 

"It  mayn't  be  so  serious  as  your  wife  thinks. 
She'd  naturally  be  alarmed  and  fear  the  worst. 
When  you  get  home,  you  may  find  him  out  of 
danger."  But  she  had  noticed  that  the  telegram 
had  been  despatched  at  seven  in  the  morning, 
and  she  felt  what  this  delay  that  he  had  to  bear 
must  be  to  him. 

"I  daresay,"  he  said;  "yes — thanks.     Where 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  235 

shall  I  tell  the  man  to  drive?  No,  why  get  out? 
What  street  did  you  say  you  were  in?" 

She  steadied  her  lip  between  her  teeth  for  an 
instant.  "Dome  Street,"  she  said;  "number  six. 
Will  you — Mr.  Oliphant,  will  you  let  me  know 
when  you  come  back?    Hope  for  the  best!" 

He  had  paid  the  cabman,  and  was  turning 
away  when  she  called  to  him  eagerly. 

"Get  in,"  she  cried,  "get  in  and  drive  to  the 
station!  Perhaps  you  can  get  home  and  back 
before  the  piece  begins!" 

He  hadn't  thought  of  that.  The  suggestion, 
the  vague  chance,  quickened  his  nerves.  The 
cab  rocked  as  they  raced  up  the  hill. 

They  learnt  that  the  best  train  left  at  two,  and 
was  due  at  Victoria  at  3.40.  He  might  be  at 
home  before  four;  the  doubt  was  whether  he 
could  return  in  time.  But  they  had  ten  minutes 
to  find  out,  and  they  saw  that,  allowing  him  an 
hour  in  the  flat,  it  was  possible ;  there  was  a  train 
from  Victoria  at  5.2  which  reached  Brighton  at 
seven. 

"You'll  soon  be  with  him  now,"  she  said  at 
the  window  of  the  compartment.  "Don't  worry 
more  than  you  can  help !" 

Her  earnest  face  was  the  last  thing  that  im- 
pressed him  vividly  until  he  saw  his  wife's. 

There  was  no  need  to  frame  the  question.    The 


236  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

answer  was  in  the  air.  He  knew  the  child  was 
dead. 

Blanche's  eyes  were  swollen,  and  the  hair  on 
her  forehead  was  moist  with  eau  de  Cologne. 
Her  hands  hung  inertly  at  her  sides.  At  the 
sight  of  him  she  burst  into  tears,  and  he  took  her 
in  his  arms.  Neither  had  spoken  yet.  She  spoke 
first. 

"He  died  at  ten  o'clock,"  she  said. 

Oliphant  released  her,  and  crossed  the  floor 
quite  aimlessly.  He  stared  down  at  the  traffic 
for  a  minute,  and  retraced  his  steps. 

"What  time  did  he — die?"  he  asked. 

"At  ten  o'clock,"  she  repeated.  "We  thought 
it  was  only  a  cold — with  his  teeth;  and  then  the 
doctor  said  it  was  pneumonia.  He  was  a  very 
good  doctor.  Mother  was  here,  too — she's  just 
gone  out;  she'll  be  back  presently.  Oh,  my  little 
angel  in  Heaven!    I've  cried  myself  ill!" 

"Where?"  said  Oliphant,  after  another  silence. 

"In  the  nursery,"  she  replied. 

The  word  made  him  wince.  He  went  to  the 
room  slowly,  and  crept  forward  as  if  the  child 
had  slept.  The  curtains  of  the  cot  were  drawn. 
He  parted  them,  and  looked.  He  had  left  the 
door  open:  he  went  back  and  shut  it;  and  sat 
down. 

The   woman   wandered   about  the   drawing- 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  237 

room.  Her  head  ached  badly,  and  she  reflected 
that  it  was  fortunate  "Mother"  was  available  "to 
see  to  things,"  for  she  could  never  have  done  it 
herself:  she  was  too  highly  strung.  It  seemed 
thankless  to  perceive  the  fact — and  she  wouldn't 
for  the  world  hurt  Mother's  feelings  by  hinting 
it — but  to  be  able  to  attend  to  such  matters  im- 
plied a  certain  callousness.  .  .  .  Her  little  angel 
in  Heaven!  She  gazed  at  the  sky  from  the  win- 
dow where  Oliphant  had  stared  at  the  omnibuses. 
Her  "precious"  was  with  God!  The  possibility 
of  a  future  state  was  a  subject  to  which  normally 
she  never  gave  a  thought,  but  now  an  unconscious 
remembrance  of  a  Transformation  Scene  soothed 
her  pain.  .  .  . 

Royce  was  a  long  while  in  there!  He  would 
be  frightfully  grieved  of  course — he  had  been  so 
fond  of  Baby.  What  she  really  needed  was  to 
be  with  someone  who  hadn't  loved  the  mite;  she 
was  so  miserable  that  she  wanted  brightening  up ! 
She  required  to  be  taken  away  somewhere  and 
made  to  forget;  she  ought  to  be  compelled  to 
gather  a  little  amusement.  .  .  . 

Jay's!  .  .  .  Crape  for  an  infant  would  be  too 

much.    In  black,  as  she  had  fair  hair How 

horrid  it  was  to  be  obliged  to  think  of  such 
things!  Ah,  but  how  passionately  she  suffered 
in  her  heart — nobody  could  understand!     Still 


238  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

people  would  pity  her,  and  talk.  Even  the 
public  would  speak  of  her  loss  sympathetically: 
"That  poor  Blanche  Ellerton  I"  If  The  Era  and 
The  Stage  commented  on  it,  no  doubt  a  few  of 
the  other  papers  would  say  something  too.  What 
day  was  it?  Friday.  (Oh,  the  unlucky  day! 
her  darling  had  died  on  a  Friday!)  The  Era 
came  out  to-morrow — they  wouldn't  know  so 
soon.  Unless  .  .  .  Perhaps  if  the  news  were 
"expressed"  to  the  office  at  once ? 

Oliphant  replaced  the  curtains  gently.  He 
fancied  it  must  be  nearly  half  an  hour  since  he 
entered  the  room;  he  had  forgotten  Blanche,  and 
before  he  left  he  must  try  to  comfort  her.  Poor 
girl,  how  red  her  eyes  were ! 

She  rose  and  went  to  him  quickly  as  he  re- 
turned, and  he  held  her  close  again. 

"Doesn't  he  look  sweet?"  she  whispered. 

He  found  nothing  to  say  in  answer  to  this. 

"I  shall  be  home  on  Sunday,  for  good,  you 
know,"  he  said,  since  speech  was  essential. 

She  nodded.    "When's  your  train  back?" 

"At  five."  He  glanced  at  his  watch — the  time 
had  gone  more  rapidly  than  he  had  supposed. 
"Your  mother  will  stop  with  you,  won't  she?" 

"Yes.  .  .  .  Have  you  had  anything  to  eat? 
Will  you  have  something  now?" 

"I'm  not  hungry;  no,  thanks,  dear." 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  239 

"You'd  better  have  a  drink,"  she  said,  turning 
to  a  syphon  and  a  spirit-flask.  "I've  just  had 
some  brandy  for  my  head.  You  ought  to  have 
something  or  other  before  the  show!" 

He  sat  down  in  the  chair  that  she  had  vacated 
by  the  table.  A  letter,  not  folded  yet,  lay  against 
his  hand,  and  he  drummed  his  fingers  on  it  while 
she  poured  out  the  brandy.  He  pushed  it  to  and 
fro.  He  began  to  read  it — mechanically,  with 
no  interest  in  the  letter.  Its  sense  did  not  pene- 
trate his  stupor  all  at  once :  "I  should  be  so  grate- 
ful if  you  could  find  space  to  mention.  .  .  .  My 
little  baby  died  this  morning."  What  was  that? 
"I    should   be    so    grateful   if   you    could   find 

space "    O  God!    The  meaning  rushed  upon 

him  and  turned  him  sick.  She  could  devise  an 
advertisement  from  her  child's  death ! 

The  soda-water  spurted  noisily.  It  was  the 
only  sound  in  the  room  for  several  seconds.  He 
sat  motionless,  his  gaze  riveted  on  her  hand- 
writing; and  Blanche,  holding  the  glass,  stood 
watching  him.  She  was  chagrined  to  find  him 
reading  the  note — he  might  misconstrue  it  and 
think  her  unfeeling!  Was  he  going  to  reproach 
her? 

He  was  questioning  what  he  should  say.  That 
she  revolted  him?  He  could  tell  her  no  less  if 
he  spoke  of  it  at  all.    He  might  destroy  the  note, 


240  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

forbid  its  being  sent.  She  would  defend  herself, 
perhaps  have  hysterics;  and  he  was  too  heart- 
sick to  remonstrate  and  discuss  and  upbraid.  To 
what  end  all  that?  She  was  &s  she  was;  a  pain- 
ful scene  wouldn't  regenerate  her.  But  was  she 
human? 

He  got  up,  and  she  met  him  with  the  glass 
diffidently. 

"You're  going  to  have  your  drink,  aren't  you?" 
she  asked. 

"No,"  he  said,  "I  don't  want  one,  thank  you. 
I  must  go,  or  I  shall  miss  the  train.  Where's 
my  hat?  .  .  .  Good-bye." 

"Good-bye,  darling,"  she  said. 

He  would  not,  he  could  not,  touch  her  face; 
he  dropped  the  sound  of  a  kiss  upon  her  hair. 
She  had  put  her  arms  round  his  neck,  and  he 
thanked  Heaven  when  he  was  free  of  them. 

To  act  at  night  was  a  restorative;  it  was  the 
afterwards,  sitting  alone  in  his  apartments,  that 
was  terrible.  And  more  terrible  still  was  the 
thought  that  he  must  so  soon  sit  with  her  at  home. 
Home?  The  place  where  she  had  trampled  on 
the  dead!  Now  that  the  child  was  gone,  what 
did  it  hold?  His  child,  even  more  his  hopes  for 
his  child,  had  leavened  the  bitterness  of  his 
blunder;  but  the  pictures  he  had  seen  of  Hugh 
at  three  and  Hugh  at  seven,  of  Hugh  head  boy 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  241 

at  Harrow,  could  never  be  looked  at  again. 
They  must  be  put  away — his  pictures  and  Baby's 

all  together.    And  she  could And  she  was 

his  wife!  The  woman  who  could  do  this  thing 
was  his  wife!  Why  should  such  women  bear 
children?  Well,  she  had  known  herself;  she  had 
done  her  best  to  prevent  it ! 

He  remembered  that  Miss  King  was  waiting 
to  hear  from  him — he  would  go  in  the  morning. 
She  had  told  him  her  address,  and  begged  him 
to  let  her  know.  The  number  had  escaped  him, 
but  she  was  staying  in  Dome  Street.  Was  it 
six? 

He  went  at  half -past  ten,  before  she  was  likely 
to  be  out.  The  alternative  of  seeking  her  among 
the  crowd  on  the  front  jarred  upon  him  to-day, 
and  in  the  afternoon  she  would  be  playing  at 
the  theatre. 

The  landlady  ushered  him  without  inquiry  into 
a  small  parlour.  Alma  was  kneeling  before  a 
theatrical  hamper,  completing  her  packing.  She 
lifted  herself  slowly,  and  advanced  with  her  gaze 
fixed  on  his  face. 

"He  is  dead,"  said  Oliphant. 

She  put  out  her  hand,  and  he  held  it  tightly. 
There  was  comfort  in  her  touch. 

"Sit  down,"  she  murmured,  moving  to  the 
hearth.     "I — I  was  afraid  it  meant  that,  when 


242  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

no  message  came  last  night.  .  .  .  You  know 
what  I  want  to  ask  you?" 

"I  was  too  late." 

They  sat  opposite  each  other  without  speak- 
ing. The  misery  in  his  eyes  made  her  heart 
ache. 

"You're  packing  early,"  said  Oliphant  at  last, 
with  an  effort. 

"Yes;  we've  a  matinee,  you  know,  and  the 
lorry  will  be  here  this  afternoon.  We  leave  at 
seven  in  the  morning." 

"Where  do  you  go? — to  Plymouth,  isn't  it? 
And  then?    How  long  does  the  tour  last?" 

"I  think  we're  booked  up  to  the  last  week  in 
December.  Don't  make  small  talk,  please.  I 
don't  want  to." 

"I  didn't  come  to  depress  you — perhaps  it  was 
rather  cowardly  to  come  at  all.  I  might  have 
sent  you  word." 

"It  was  kinder  to  come.  I  don't  like  to  ask 
you  questions,  but  if  you  could  speak  of  him  to 
me,  I  should  be  glad." 

"It's  all  here!"  he  exclaimed  chokily. 

"Ah,  I  know.  But  it  will  go — the  worst.  The 
memory  won't  go,  but  it  gets  tenderer.  You'll 
love  to  think  of  him  by  and  by." 

"It  seems  so  motiveless,  a  little  child  like  that. 
He  was — if  you  had  seen  him  you'd  understand. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  243 

Of  course  everybody  thinks  his  own  child  best, 
but  he — had  ways.  Why  should  he  be  born  only 
to  be  snatched  from  me  again?  I  wanted  him 
so  much!  .  .  .  You  believe — do  you  believe — in 
Heaven?" 

"Yes.  I'm  so  simple  a  woman  that  I've  never 
questioned  it.  When  I  lost  my  mother,  my  only 
comfort  was  that  I  wasn't  clever  and  full  of 
doubts.  Are  you  so  clever  that  you're  hopeless 
now?" 

"No;  I  believe,"  he  said.  "I  haven't  the  im- 
agination to  conceive  that  Heaven's  a  myth." 

"I  suppose  that  each  of  us  has  a  different 
notion  of  Heaven,  just  as  all  the  notions  are 
wrong;  but  I  only  think  of  it  as  a  place  where 
people  who've  loved  are  given  back  to  one  an- 
other and  need  never  fear  parting  any  more.  I 
don't  see  how  mine  can  be  very  wrong.  And  I 
think  we  shall  look  just  the  same  to  them, 
although  we  may  have  grown  old  since  we  lost 
them,  as  we  did  the  day  they  died.  I  think  I 
shall  still  look  a  girl  to  my  mother  if  I  live  to  be 
eighty."  She  gave  a  half  smile.  "If  I  am  good 
enough  to  go  to  Heaven!" 

"And  they  too  us?"  he  asked.  "Should  I  find 
a  baby  in  fifty  years?" 

"Yes,  I  think  you  would  find  a  little  baby  in 
fifty  years.    Just  the  little  baby  you  had  kissed, 


244  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

and  remembered.  But  you  should  be  able  to  give 
ideas  to  me — you  were  going  to  be  a  clergy- 
man." 

"You,"  said  Oliphant,  "are  a  good  woman; 
a  good  woman  can  teach  us  all."  He  had  not 
mentioned  his  wife's  name,  and  the  reservation 
by  which  he  imagined  that  half  his  sorrow  had 
been  concealed  was  doubling  Alma's  compassion 
for  him. 

He  was  loath  to  take  his  leave,  and  even  when 
he  had  risen,  they  lingered  by  the  window. 

"I'm  glad  I  came,"  he  said  at  last;  "you've 
been  very  kind  to  me.  I  wish  we  hadn't  matinees, 
or  that  you  didn't  start  so  early  to-morrow.  Now 
I'll  let  you  finish  your  packing."  He  looked 
round  the  humble  room  bright  with  the  morning 
sunshine.  "Are  those  books  yours?  Are  they 
to  go  in  too?"  He  went  to  the  chair  where  they 
lay,  and  brought  them  to  her,  and  stood  beside 
her  while  she  put  them  in  the  hamper.  "Good- 
bye, Miss  King." 

"Good-bye,"  she  said.  "And  think  of  your 
art  and  your  hopes,  and  make  us  all  proud  of 
you!" 

"I  wonder  when  I  shall  meet  you  again?  You 
and  I  are  always  being  good  friends  for  a  little 
while,  and  then  losing  sight  of  each  other,  aren't 
we?" 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  245 

The  firmness  of  her  hand-clasp  seemed  to  lend 
him  strength,  as  it  had  given  him  comfort  when 
he  entered.    Yes,  his  art  remained ! 

Alma  went  back  to  the  window,  and  watched 
him  till  he  turned  the  corner  of  the  street. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

He  did  not  return  to  town  until  the  morning 
of  the  funeral.  In  the  afternoon  the  cot  and  the 
toys,  all  the  belongings  of  the  dead  baby,  were 
removed  from  the  nursery.  The  room  was  now 
Oliphant's;  it  was  here  that  he  studied  and  he 
slept. 

There  had  been  no  open  rupture,  for  Blanche 
had  refrained  from  asking  his  reason;  she  knew 
it,  and  affected  to  attribute  the  expression  of  his 
wish  to  morbid  grief.  She  considered  that  he 
was  suffering  from  a  temporary  derangement  of 
the  intellect,  and  the  time  to  show  her  resentment 
would  be  when  he  came  to  his  senses. 

But  to  a  man  of  Oliphant's  temperament  no 
other  course  was  possible  if  they  were  to  remain 
under  one  roof.  When  he  reflected  that  within 
six  hours  of  their  child's  death  she  could  do  what 
she  had  done,  she  appeared  to  him  a  monstrosity. 
Every  nerve  in  him  shrank  from  the  suggestion 
of  contact  with  her.  He  felt  that  to  take  this 
abnormal  creature  in  his  arms  as  a  wife  would 

246 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  247 

be  a  horrible  action — an  offence  after  which  he 
would  be  degraded,  and  repulsive  to  himself. 

Holding  his  cause  the  slightest,  and  yet  afraid 
of  discussing  it,  Blanche's  disguise  was  at  first 
painfully  thin,  her  amiability  was  an  obvious 
bravado.  But  as  the  weeks  went  by,  the  influence 
of  custom  softened  the  asperities  of  the  anoma- 
lous relationship.  Both  were  in  engagements: 
Oliphant  still  at  the  Pantheon — where  Romeo 
and  Juliet  had  been  succeeded  by  a  revival  of 
Much  Ado  About  Nothing — and  the  woman  de- 
riving consolation  from  a  hit  at  the  Pall  Mall. 
With  months  they  acquired  a  manner  nearly  as 
free  as  that  which  had  subsisted  between  them 
before  the  baby  died.  Oliphant  could  sit  in  a 
room  with  her  without  shuddering ;  and  if  a  pro- 
longed tete-a-tete  distressed  him  still,  this  had 
its  compensation  to  her  in  the  fact  that  it  made 
him  readier  to  accept  the  invitations  of  "people 
worth  knowing" — a  circle  which,  thanks  to  her 
assiduity  and  his  professional  successes,  was 
gradually  widening  to  the  "romantic  couple." 

By  the  time  the  season  had  well  advanced,  the 
circle  had  supplied  a  counter-irritant  to  her 
original  complaint.  People,  otherwise  well-bred, 
question  artists  about  their  prospects  and  their 
incomes  with  an  effrontery  that  they  would  never 
dream  of  displaying  towards  those  in  business, 


248  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

and  gushing  matrons  sometimes  asked  her  when 
she  and  her  clever,  delightful  husband  were  going 
to  have  a  theatre  of  their  own.  This  unconscious 
impertinence  galled  her,  because  if  Royce  had 
not  been  a  noodle — that  was  how  she  mentally 
expressed  it — they  might  have  had  their  own 
theatre  already.  She  craved  for  her  own  theatre 
and  the  attendant  importance.  When  she  men- 
tioned the  subject  to  him  he  was  as  unsatisfactory 
as  ever,  and  there  were  moments  of  solitude  in 
which  she  raged,  and  demanded  of  the  irrespon- 
sive walls  what  marriage  with  such  a  visionary 
had  given  to  her. 

She  determined  to  put  Otho  Fairbairn's 
friendship  to  the  test  herself ;  and  one  afternoon, 
when  she  was  at  home  alone,  he  was  announced. 
She  prayed  that  no  one  else  would  call. 

"Royce  is  out,"  she  murmured;  "but  I  daresay 
he'll  be  back  soon.    Put  your  hat  down." 

"You  look  tired,"  he  said  with  concern. 

She  shrugged  her  shoulders  and  laughed  con- 
strainedly: "Oh  no!    What's  the  news?" 

"With  me?  Do  I  ever  have  news?  I  came 
to  hear  news — to  be  entertained.  Behold  the 
selfishness  of  man  and  the  abuse  of  hospitality!" 

"I  don't  think  you  ever  find  us  very  entertain- 
ing, do  you?"  she  said.  "I  was  beginning  to  think 
you  found  us  so  dull  that  you  weren't  coming 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  249 

any  more.  How  long  is  it  since  you've  been  here 
— three  months?" 

"Mrs.  Royce!"  He  had  begged  leave  to  call 
her  "Mrs.  Royce,"  saying  "the  other  sounded 
so  awfully  formal";  and  when  she  had  lisped 
"Otho  formal!"  permission  was  accorded. 

"Three  months,  isn't  it?"  she  said;  "or  is  it 
four?  We  were  asking  each  other  what  we  had 
done!" 

"Mrs.  Royce!  It's  not  two!  And  I've  been 
away.  You  aren't  offended  with  me  really,  are 
you?" 

Until  now  it  had  not  occurred  to  her  that  she 
might  be  offended;  she  had  only  been  impatient 
for  his  visit;  but  it  was  amusing  to  watch  his 
pink-and-white  dismay.    She  nodded  slowly. 

"Oh,  I  say,  I'm  immensely  sorry,"  he  ex- 
claimed, "if  you  mean  it!    And  is  Royce,  too?" 

"I  can't  answer  for  Royce.  J'm  offended,  if 
that  matters!" 

"Oh,  please  don't  be  unkind;  I've  been  away, 
on  my  honour !  I  left  town  the  first  week  in  May 
— broke  all  my  engagements  and  went  into  the 
country.  Impulse.  But  in  future  I  am  always 
going  to  spend  the  season  in  the  country.  That 
London  should  be  fashionable  during  the  months 
when  the  country  looks  its  loveliest  is  a  monu- 
mental instance  of  human  perversity.    I  was  at 


250  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

Studland — I  don't  suppose  you  know  it?  I  can't 
tell  you  how  peaceful,  how  divine  it  was!" 

"Has  she  accepted  you?"  asked  the  lady. 

"Oh,  now  you're  chaffing — that  means  I'm  for- 
given.   Thank  you,  Mrs.  Royce." 

"I'm  quite  serious.  You  don't  expect  me  to 
believe  that  you  left  town  in  May  for — where 
was  it? — somewhere  peaceful  and  divine,  unless 
there  was  an  attraction?" 

"There  was  an  attraction,"  said  Otho;  "there 
was  Nature!  Nature  and  Art.  I  was  down 
there  with  a  man  who  was  making  studies  for  a 
picture.  You  observe  I'm  technical:  'making 
studies'!  He  used  to  paint,  and  I  used  to  read 
poetry.  I  got  up  at  eight  every  morning,  and 
lived  in  the  sunshine.  When  I  think  of  all  the 
springs  I've  wasted  in  Piccadilly  I  feel  I've  been 
a  most  awful  ass,  really  I  do." 

"And  you  didn't  read  the  poetry  to  a  girl?" 

"I  never  spoke  to  a  girl  the  whole  time  I  was 
there.  One  doesn't  keep  talking  about  some 
things,  Mrs.  Royce,  but  there  are  wounds  that 
don't  heal."  He  looked  at  her  plaintively.  "Did 
you  think  I  was  so  shallow  that  I  could  forget 
so  soon?  You  were  very  nice  to  me  once  when  I 
stayed  and  bored  you  an  unconscionable  time.  I 
thought  you  understood  that  I  shouldn't  for- 
get?" 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  251 

"But  you  must  forget,"  she  replied.  "I  re- 
member what  I  said  better  than  you  do.  I  said 
you'd  meet  somebody  before  long  who  would 
make  you  ashamed  of  yourself  for  having  railed 
against  us  poor  women.  All  women  were  heart- 
less because  one  girl  had  treated  you  badly.  Oh, 
Mr.  Fairbairn!" 

"I  know,"  he  said.  "Yes,  I  was  very  absurd — 
all  that's  past.  You  were  the  'somebody'  who 
made  me  ashamed  of  that.  But  I  shall  never 
love  again.  I  could  never  feel  more  than  friend- 
ship for  any  woman  now." 

"You  are  very  faithful!"  she  said,  regarding 
him  with  a  display  of  eager  interest.  "I  thought 
it  was  only  my  sex  who  could  be  so  faithful  as 
all  that?" 

11  Your  sex?"  he  exclaimed.    "Why " 

"Ah!"  she  said,  lifting  an  admonitory  finger. 

"You  are  always  the  exception,  Mrs.  Royce!" 
he  laughed. 

"The  'present  company,' "  said  she.  "Of 
course!" 

"No,  but  I  mean  it  honestly.  I've  never  seen 
any  woman  so — so  sympathetic,  and  so  devoted 
to  her  husband  as  you  are.  I  congratulated 
Royce  verbally  before  I  met  you — as  in  duty 
bound;  but  since  I've  known  you,  I've  congratu- 
lated him  a  hundred  times  in  my  own  mind.    And 


252  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

how  he  has  forged  ahead  since  his  marriage! 
You've  been  a  Mascotte  to  him." 

She  sighed. 

"Don't  you  think  you  have?  Why  are  you 
looking  doubtful?" 

"Oh,  of  course  he  has  got  on,"  she  said;  "but 
I  wish  my  mascotry — what  is  the  word? — could 
take  him  further!  I  want  to  see  Royce  in  a 
position  to  choose  his  parts  and  to  show  people 
what  he  can  really  do." 

"He  ought  to  have  a  theatre,"  said  Fairbairn. 

Her  hands  rose,  and  fell  to  her  lap,  in  a  little 
impatient  gesture:  "Let's  talk  of  something  else, 
Mr.  Fairbairn,  please — I  didn't  mean  to  mention 
this!  I  know  you  once  offered  to  start  him  in  a 
theatre,  so  it's  the  one  subject  I  can't  speak  to 
you  about." 

"But  why?"  he  asked.    "Why  can't  you?" 

"Isn't  it  natural?     You  might  think  I 

Besides,  Royce  would  be  very  angry  if  he  knew 
that  I'd  let  you  guess  we  were  troubled." 

"Do  you  mean  that  you  are  in  trouble  because 
he  can't  take  a  theatre — that  you  are  both  worry- 
ing about  it?" 

"Don't  make  me  say  any  more,"  she  begged. 
"I'd  rather  not!" 

"But" his  eyes  were  big  and  grieved.    "Is 

this  fair  to  me?     You  know  I'd  like  to  serve 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  253 

Royce.  And  I  thought  you  and  I  were  friends? 
You  must  trust  me.  Between  ourselves!  Do 
you  really  mean  you're  both  worried  because  he 
can't  take  a  theatre?" 

"Well,  I'll  say  that  I  am.  If  you  spoke  to 
Royce,  he  would  tell  you  that  it  is  too  soon — 
according  to  Royce  it  will  always  be  too  soon! 
Royce  lacks  confidence.  This  is  one  of  the  cases 
where  a  woman  sees  further  than  a  man.  Royce 
is  wasting  his  time  at  the  Pantheon  now.  He 
can  never  do  any  better  there  than  he  has  done. 
What  has  he  to  look  forward  to?  That  Greatorex 
will  ask  him  to  play  his  parts  ?  Or  put  on  Othello 
to  give  Mr.  Royce  Oliphant  the  opportunity  to 
make  the  success  of  the  evening  as  Iago?  Short 
of  management  he  has  gone  as  far  as  he  can 
get.  Well !  one  day  he  will  go  into  management. 
Some  capitalist  will  come  along  and  offer  to 
back  him — there  is  no  risk  about  it;  it  will  be 
a  very  good  investment — but  he  won't  be  so 
young  then;  some  of  his  best  years  will  have 
been  lost;  the  time  between  to-day  and  the  day 
when  the  capitalist  appears  will  have  been 
wasted.  I  see  it  more  clearly  than  the  poor  boy 
himself,  though,  if  he  told  the  truth,  he  sees  it 
partially  too.  As  his  wife,  how  can  I  help  being 
distressed?" 

"But,  my  dear  Mrs.  Royce,"  cried  Otho,  "why 


254  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

haven't  you  said  this  to  me  before?    You  knew 

of  my  offer  to  him why  didn't  you  hint  to 

me  that  it  might  be  repeated?  I've  never  thought 
about  it ;  he  seemed  to  me  to  be  doing  splendidly 
— what  do  I  know  of  stage  matters?  I  feel 
awfully  guilty,  really!  Of  course,  he  ought  to 
have  a  theatre!  Now  you've  put  it  to  me,  I 
understand.  I'll  have  a  talk  to  him  this  after- 
noon." 

"No,  no!"  she  said,  aflame  with  joy;  "it 
mustn't  look  as  if  it  came  from  me — he'd  never 
forgive  me.  Speak  to  him  when  you're  here 
again;  and  be  firm!  Tell  him  he's  a  fool,  and 
insist  on  having  your  way — I  should  fancy  you 
generally  get  your  way  when  your  mind  is  made 

up,  don't  you?     Say oh,  say  whatever  you 

like,  but  don't  let  him  suspect  that  we've  been 
exchanging  confidences,  or  his  pride  will  be  up 
in  arms  in  a  moment!" 

Otho  promised  to  exercise  the  utmost  diplo- 
macy; the  confederate  was  to  say  little,  and  he 
was  to  address  his  arguments  as  much  to  her  as 
to  Oliphant.  It  was  arranged  that  he  should 
drop  in  a  few  days  later  without  warning.  The 
subtlety  of  the  well-meant  scheme  to  deceive  his 
friend  pleased  him  vastly,  and  it  was  not  a  whit 
less  gratifying  as  he  took  his  leave  to  remember 
that  "Mrs.  Royce"  would  be  benefited  as  well. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  255 

Blanche  thought  he  was  the  most  charming 
young  man  she  had  ever  met.  She  had  not 
nursed  many  misgivings,  but  the  alacrity  of  his 
response  warmed  her  heart  towards  him;  she 
regretted  that  she  had  been  compelled  to  be  a 
trifle  disingenuous. 

The  plan  was  duly  executed;  but,  to  her  sur- 
prise and  joy,  Oliphant  demurred  very  faintly. 
He  proved  quite  willing  to  be  persuaded  that  it 
was  not  premature  for  him  to  adventure  manage- 
ment. He  had  been  loath  to  take  the  first  step, 
averse  from  asking  the  favour,  but  now  that 
Fairbairn  again  came  forward  without  solicita- 
tion, every  pulse  in  him  leapt  with  gladness. 

"You  would  be  backing  your  opinion  of  us 
very  heavily,  Otho,"  he  said;  "don't  forget  that 
if  it  proved  a  mistake,  it  would  be  an  expensive 
one!  If  you're  prepared  to  risk  it,  Heaven 
knows  I  can't  say  'Don't' !  But  think  the  matter 
well  over  first ;  we'll  talk  of  it  again." 

"I've  nothing  to  think  about,"  persisted  Fair- 
bairn; "it's  for  you  to  say  'yes'  or  'no.'  If  I'm 
any  judge  of  acting,  I  shan't  lose — on  the  con" 
trary,  it  will  be  a  rattling  good  thing  for  me." 
He  turned  to  Blanche.  "You  see  the  commer- 
cial instinct  can't  be  silenced,  Mrs.  Royce;  it's 
hereditary!" 

She  laughed.     "A  theatre  is   a  business  to 


256  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

everyone.  Well,  it's  nothing  to  do  with  me — 
Royce  must  decide." 

"You  know  the  only  lines  on  which  I'd  run 
a  theatre,"  said  Oliphant,  speaking  thickly;  "I 
want  to  produce  the  best  available  work.  There 
will  be  no  concessions  to  catch  the  crowd.  There 
is  no  fortune,  no  large  income,  to  be  made  from 
a  theatre  that  I  control." 

"It's  going  to  be  'art  for  art's  sake,'  "  returned 
Otho;  "I  quite  understand.  I  haven't  a  con- 
suming desire  to  drop  a  heap  of  money,  but  I 
can't  pretend  that  I'm  only  actuated  by  the  hope 
of  making  a  pot,  either.  If  it  does  put  anything 
in  my  pocket,  I  shan't  be  angry  with  you;  if  it 
only  pays  expenses  there'll  be  satisfaction  enough 
in  feeling  that  I've  a  share  in  an  artistic  under- 
taking. Which  theatre  do  you  think  you  might 
get?" 

"I  haven't  a  notion.  We  shan't  get  a  house 
directly  we  want  one,  you  know — I  can't  walk 
into  management  next  month.  And  first  there 
are  the  plays  to  be  considered — there  are  a  great 
many  things  to  be  considered!  I  warn  you 
you'll  be  badgered  to  death  before  the  curtain 
goes  up." 

"Not  II  I  shall  come  to  the  first  night,  or 
the  dress-rehearsal,  when  the  bother  is  all  over. 
The  work  is  for  you,  my  friend  I" 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  25? 

"Well,"  cried  Oliphant,  "we  shall  have  to  go 
into  figures,  and  you  shall  tell  me  what  your  idea 
is."  His  excitement  broke  into  action,  and  he 
clapped  Fairbairn  on  the  shoulder  wildly.  "You 
shall  be  proud  of  your  stage,  Otho!  I  don't 
swear  for  the  actor-manager,  but  you  shall  be 
proud  of  the  work,  I  promise  you !  What  do  you 
say,  Blanche?    We'll  do  him  justice,  won't  we?" 

She  assented  gaily,  but  he  had  not  waited  for 
her  assent.  Momentarily  he  had  forgotten  that 
their  views  were  opposed,  and  his  delight  was 
boundless.  It  was  only  after  an  appointment 
had  been  made  for  the  morrow,  and  Fairbairn 
had  gone,  that  the  first  stir  of  remembrance 
tinged  elation  with  regret,  and  he  perceived  anew 
that  to  his  own  ears  the  triumphal  march  must 
always  have  a  discord. 

Blanche  and  he  paced  the  room.  Both  were 
shaken  by  the  prospect,  but  to  each  the  prospect 
was  different.  The  wife  saw  the  obvious — showy 
parts,  public  adulation  and  professional  defer- 
ence, and  a  life-size  portrait  of  herself  in  the 
foyer.  How  she  wished  that  one  or  two  women 
that  she  hated  would  apply  for  engagements! 
The  man,  to  whom  dramatic  art  was  a  religion, 
saw  a  theatre  that  should  be  the  expression  of 
his  life.  He  saw  on  how  marvellous  a  basis  this 
ideal  theatre  would  be  reared — due  to  a  friend 


258  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

who  did  not  regard  it  as  a  means  of  money- 
making.  As  he  realised  the  magnitude  of  his 
opportunity,  Oliphant  trembled,  and  wrung  his 
hands  in  a  prayer  that  he  might  be  worthy  of  the 
power  vested  in  him. 

She  brought  him  back  to  the  practical  with  a 
jerk. 

"What  shall  we  put  our  salaries  down  at?" 
she  asked. 

"I  haven't  thought  about  it,"  he  said.  "How 
much  do  you  suggest?" 

"A  hundred,"  she  said  promptly. 

"A  hundred?"  he  echoed.    "How  a  hundred?" 

"/'m  getting  twenty." 

"But  I'm  very  far  from  getting  eighty!  How 
a  hundred?  In  common  gratitude  we  must  put 
down  our  salaries  at  less  than  they  would  be 
anywhere  else — not  more!  Remember  that  the 
capital  is  entirely  Otho's;  we  risk  nothing." 

"  'Less'?"  she  exclaimed;  "when  we  do  all  the 
work?" 

"My  dear  Blanche,  we  share  the  profits." 

"Yes,  I  know.  Well,  if  we  charge  the  same 
it's  fair  enough — I  don't  see  why  we  should 
charge  'less.'  If  it  weren't  for  us,  there  wouldn't 
be  any  profits." 

"And  if  it  weren't  for  Otho's  generosity,  we 
shouldn't  have  a  theatre.     He  is  doing  a  very 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  259 

wonderful  thing — let's  show  that  we  appreciate 
it !  There's  not  one  man  in  a  million  who  would 
start  another  in  a  theatre  from  pure  good  feeling. 
He  gives  us  perfect  liberty — he  says :  'You  want 
a  theatre;  take  one,  and  play  whatever  you  like. 
If  there's  a  loss  I'll  meet  it.'  It's  an  unpre- 
cedented offer.  It  isn't  even  as  if  he  felt  as — 
as  we  do.  Otho  is  a  fellow  who  likes  literature 
and  art  everywhere  excepting  on  the  stage.  If  it 
weren't  for  us — and  he  ran  a  theatre  at  all — he'd 
do  it  for  a  lark  and  put  up  musical  comedy.  We 
can't  treat  him  as  if  he  were  a  speculator." 

"What  did  you  mean,"  she  said,  "by  telling 
him  there  couldn't  be  any  fortune,  any  large 
income?  Why  not?  They  say  Wilkie  made  fifty 
thousand  pounds  out  of  Only  Once  More  alone !" 

"Only  Once  More  was  a  farce,"  said  Oliphant; 
"we  don't  propose  to  play  farce,  do  we?  You 
wouldn't  like  that  yourself?" 

"No,  but  plenty  of  dramas  make  money.  Look 
what  the  Hendons  made  at  the  Mirror!  That 
was  drama.  Look  what  Shedlock  is  doing  at  the 
Queen's  with  this  last  ghastly  thing — I  hear  the 
people  are  eating  it." 

He  shivered. 

"I  think  you  know,"  he  said,  "I'd  rather  be 
in  engagements  all  my  life  than  have  a  theatre 
and  run  it  on  Mr.  Shedlock's  lines.    I'll  produce 


260  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

the  best  work,  or  none.  And  believe  me, 
Blanche,  you  can  get  all  you  want  by  aiming 
at  the  highest — you  will  be  much  more  prominent 
than  if  you  content  yourself  with  the  second- 
rate." 

"But  I  shan't  get  all  I  want  if  we're  going  to 
be  poor  all  our  lives,"  she  answered.  "I  do 
hope,  Royce,  you  aren't  going  to  fritter  this 
chance  away  on  fads?" 

"  'Poor,'  "  he  repeated;  "do  you  think  we're 
poor?  What  more  can  you  want ?  You've  heaps 
of  frocks;  we've  a  pretty  flat;  you  need  never 
look  twice  at  a  five-pound  note " 

"But  all  this,"  she  interrupted  impatiently, 
"will  be  poverty  when  we're  in  management. 
We  aren't  going  to  live  here,  and  have  two  people 
to  lunch  once  a  month,  when  we've  our  theatre. 
We  shall  have  to  give  garden  parties,  and  enter- 
tain on  a  big  scale." 

He  looked  at  her,  surprised. 

"Why?"  he  said.    "And  how?    What  with?" 

"Yes,  'what  with?'— that's  just  it!  If  we  don't 
make  money,  we  can't  do  it.  Our  salaries,  espe- 
cially if  you're  going  to  cut  them  down,  won't 
be  enough.  One  minute  you  say  we  share  the 
profits,  and  the  next  you  say  there  won't  be 
any." 

"I  don't  think  I  said  that — I  certainly  trust 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  261 

there  will  be.  All  I  said  was  that  they  wouldn't 
be  great,  at  all  events  at  the  beginning.  I'm 
not  so  eccentric  that  I'd  rather  avoid  a  profit 
than  make  one." 

"That's  some  comfort!"  she  returned.  "Of 
course  one  wants  to  do  good  pieces!  You  don't 
suppose  that  Z'm  so  eccentric  that  I'd  prefer 
them  bad,  do  you?  Only  no  Brand,  Royce — if 
you're  going  to  open  the  campaign  with  Brand 
because  you  want  to  play  the  part,  we  shall  be 
doomed." 

"Have  you  read  it?"  he  inquired. 

"No,  dear,"  she  said,  "but  I  tried  to." 

Oliphant  converted  a  sigh  into  a  laugh. 

"Well,"  he  replied,  "I  wasn't  thinking  of 
Brand.  I'd  like  to  work  with  you  hand  in  hand, 
Blanche.  Let's  correct  each  other's  mistakes — 
we  both  make  them,  no  doubt.  If  you  tend  to 
one  extreme,  I  suppose,  I  tend  to  the  other.  If 
we  meet  half-way " 

"It  will  be  a  sensible  compromise!"  she  de- 
clared, smiling. 

His  heart  sank  at  the  word ;  he  had  felt  it  com- 
ing when  he  paused,  and  the  clang  of  it  knelled 
in  his  soul.  Was  he  talking  of  "compromise"  in 
the  first  hour?  No,  he  would  not  juggle  with 
his  conscience;  he  would  be  true  to  his  faith! 
Though  conquest  abroad  would  be  rendered  ten 


262  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

times  harder  by  opposition  in  his  home,  he  would 
stick  to  his  colours  to  the  last.  He  had  yearned 
for  this  opportunity,  dreamed  of  it,  laboured  and 
lived  for  it.  God  had  sent  it  to  him;  and  by 
God's  help  he  would  justify  the  boon! 


CHAPTER  XVII 

It  was  at  last  decided  that  the  joint  salary  of 
the  actor-manager  and  his  wife  should  be  fifty 
pounds.  Otho  was  to  be  responsible  for  the  rent, 
the  cost  of  production,  and  all  expenses  "behind" 
and  "in  front,"  and  he  volunteered  to  spend 
seventy  pounds  a  week  in  newspaper  advertise- 
ments, though  Oliphant  had  estimated  them  at 
less  than  sixty.  With  the  work  he  was  to  have 
no  concern.  Profits  were  to  be  equally  divided; 
and  Oliphant,  while  stipulating  that  there  should 
be  no  fees  for  cloak-rooms  or  programmes,  un- 
dertook that  the  business-manager  should  ar- 
range for  advertisements  on  the  programmes, 
the  commission  on  the  hire  of  opera-glasses,  and 
the  sub-letting  of  the  bars  to  the  best  advantage. 
These  were  all  details  of  which  Otho  knew  noth- 
ing, and  of  which  Oliphant  knew  much  less  than 
he  supposed.  They  pertained  to  the  seamy  side 
of  a  theatrical  enterprise,  and  could  not  be 
ignored,  however;  indeed,  the  further  the  project 
progressed,  the  more  complicated  did  the  seamy 
side  become. 

263 


264  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

But  before  it  appeared  to  progress  at  all,  Oli- 
phant  was  dismayed  to  see  how  time  passed — 
how  the  weeks  and  months  went  by  until  the 
first  night,  never  any  nearer,  seemed  as  elusive 
as  a  will-o'-the-wisp.  The  earliest  idea  had  been 
to  obtain  a  lease  of  the  Embankment  Theatre, 
but  Otho,  buoyant  with  champagne  one  night, 
had  soared  superior  to  the  scheme  just  when  the 
negotiations  were  assuming  definite  shape,  and 
had  declared  that  he  wanted  to  take  a  bigger 
house  and  "run  the  whole  thing  on  first-class 
lines."  Oliphant,  who  was  hankering  to  have  a 
poetic  play  of  Sylvain  Lacour's  done  into  Eng- 
lish— a  production  demanding  elaborate  mise-en- 
scene — was  only  too  ready  to  be  convinced  that 
the  bolder  course  was  the  wiser ;  and  the  solicitor 
to  the  Embankment  coming  to  terms  tardily, 
found  that  he  had  come  to  terms  too  late. 

A  bigger  house  was  not  immediately  available ; 
nor  could  Sylvain  Lacour  be  brought  to  believe 
all  at  once  that  any  translation  could  do  justice 
to  his  genius.  A  visit  to  Paris,  with  the  offer  of 
an  increased  percentage  of  the  receipts,  per- 
suaded him  that  he  had  underrated  the  resources 
of  the  English  language;  but  the  English  poet 
on  whom  Oliphant  had  set  his  heart  was  tem- 
porarily incapacitated  by  gout,  and  there  were, 
moreover,  all  kinds  of  anxieties  and  disappoint' 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  265 

ments  relative  to  the  modern  drama  by  which 
God  and  the  State  was  to  be  followed. 

This  God  and  the  State  appeared  to  be  an 
admirable  selection  for  the  opening  venture. 
Though  Lacour  might  not  be  a  great  dramatic 
poet,  he  came  as  near  to  being  one  as  did  any 
writer  living.  The  action  of  the  play  was  laid 
on  an  imaginary  island,  and  the  period  was  de- 
scribed simply  as  "The  Past,"  but  the  interest 
was  for  all  lands  and  for  all  times.  The  central 
situation,  too,  was  magnificent,  and  though  it  was 
a  finer  acting-scene  for  Blanche  than  for  himself, 
Oliphant  would  have  felt  it  a  privilege  merely  to 
produce  such  a  work.  That  its  beauty  should 
pass  unnoticed  looked  to  him  impossible. 

Blanche,  who  was  unable  to  read  French,  had 
heard  enough  to  understand  that  she  had  a  very 
emotional  part,  and  she  therefore  forgave  its 
being  in  verse.  Her  principal  objection  was  that 
her  costume  must  be  simple  and  poor.  Oliphant 
had  his  Court  apart  from  her,  his  scenes  of  splen- 
dour; but  the  heroine,  like  the  daughter  of 
Triboulet,  lived  in  a  world  contained  by  four 
walls,  and  only  reached  the  gates  of  the  palace, 
in  the  last  act,  to  die. 

Meanwhile,  she  had  other  meditations.  When 
they  opened  the  theatre,  they  must  have  a  larger 
drawing-room;    she    had    determined    that.      A 


266  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

garden  possibly  she  might  have  to  waive,  but  a 
larger  drawing-room  was  essential.  It  was  not 
necessary  to  discuss  the  matter  with  Royce,  but 
she  utilised  her  morning  strolls  to  interrogate 
various  house-agents  in  the  neighbourhood.  On 
one  occasion  she  met  Otho  in  Victoria  Street, 
and,  as  they  proceeded  towards  the  flat  together, 
she  told  him  where  she  had  been. 

"I'm  not  talking  to  Royce  about  it,"  she  ex- 
plained; "he  has  enough  to  think  of;  but  it  would 
be  idiotic  for  us  to  remain  where  we  are  when 
we  go  into  management.  The  more  people  we 
have  home,  and  the  more  we  visit,  the  better  for 
all  of  us  it  will  be.    Did  you  know  that?" 

"It  never  occurred  to  me,  Mrs.  Royce;  of 
course  you're  quite  right,  though." 

"I'm  so  glad  you  agree  with  me,"  she  said. 

"I  always  do,  I  think." 

"I  think  you  do — it's  very  sweet  of  you!  On 
the  first  night  we  must  have  a  reception  on  the 
stage.  I  want  you  to  bring  everybody  you  can. 
Women  as  well!  Women  can  be  so  useful. 
When — oh  when,  Mr.  Fairbairn — shall  we  know 
for  sure?  Oh,  the  suspense  of  it  all!  It's  simply 
awful." 

"Royce  expects  to  settle  for  the  May  fair,  you 
know,  now,"  he  said.  "I  do  wish  we  could  have 
got  ahead  more  quickly  for  your  sake." 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  267 

"Oh!"  she  turned  to  him  with  swift  depreca- 
tion; "please  don't  think  me  such  a  horrid  un- 
grateful wretch  as  to  grumble  to  you.  Even 
if  we  had  got  the  theatre,  we  couldn't  open 
yet.  Nobody  can  help  it;  and  you — rwell,  if  I 
grumbled  to  you,  I  should  deserve  a  shaking." 
Her  eyes  laughed  in  his  for  an  instant.  "I  think 
I  should  ask  you  to  give  it  to  me!" 

The  young  man  met  her  gaze  with  a  touch  of 
embarrassment  that  he  did  not  care  to  define. 

"Well,  I  believe  we  shall  have  a  huge  triumph 
when  the  piece  is  produced,"  he  declared.  "Don't 
you?  Of  course  I've  no  experience,  and  I  only 
judge  as  an  outsider,  but  when  I  read  it,  I  was 
tremendously  impressed." 

"How  cruel  of  you  to  remind  me  of  my  appall- 
ing ignorance!  7'm  simply  dying  to  read  it,  and 
I  can't." 

"Oh,"  he  said,  "I  forgot.  Tell  me!  Shall  I 
make  you  a  rough  translation?  Would  you  like 
me  to?" 

"Oh,  no,"  she  exclaimed;  "how  can  you  pro- 
pose such  a  thing?  Why,  it  would  be  most 
frightful  trouble!" 

"It  wouldn't  be  any  trouble  at  all,  done  for 
you.     I'll  start  it  to-night." 

"Do  you  mean  it?  Really?  But  to-night? 
Aren't  you  going  anywhere?" 


268  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"I  wasn't  going  anywhere  particular.  It  will 
be  an  immense  pleasure  to  me,  I  assure  you. 
Don't  expect  it  for  a  few  days;  you  know,  being 
verse,  it  will  take  a  little  time,  although  I  shall 
only  aim  at  conveying  the  sense.  I'll  send  it  to 
you  directly  it's  finished." 

"You  might  spare  half  an  hour  more  and  bring 
it,  mightn't  you?"  she  suggested. 

"So  I  might,"  he  said.  "Then  directly  it's 
finished,  I'll  bring  it  to  you." 

"And  read  it!"  added  Blanche  gaily.  "Oh, 
you  must  certainly  read  it.  The  adapter  always 
reads  the  play !" 

His  cheeks  grew  pinker.  "My  dear  Mrs. 
Royce,  I've  a  fair  amount  of  self-esteem — not  to 
call  it  'vanity' — but  I  shouldn't  have  the  pluck 
to  read  it  aloud  to  you  to  save  my  life." 

She  hung  her  head  in  mock  abashment. 

"I  shouldn't,"  he  insisted;  "honour  bright!" 

"Am  I  such  a  terrible  person?"  she  inquired 
humbly. 

"No,  but  you're  an  actress,  and  you'd  make 
game  of  me — not  openly  of  course,  but " 

The  reproach  in  her  face  shamed  him. 

"You  can't  mean  that,"  she  said;  "you  know 
better!    Here  we  are!    Come  in  and  see  Royce !" 

Oliphant  was  in  an  arm-chair  before  the  fire, 
with  The  Stage  in  his  hands.    Blanche  asked  him 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  269 

what  he  was  doing  with  it,  for  it  had  been  issued 
some  days.  She  unpinned  her  hat,  and  Otho 
took  her  coat  from  her;  he  was  conscious  of  a 
pleased  interest  as  he  watched  her  settling  her 
hair  before  the  glass. 

"I  was  looking  down  the  'Professional 
Cards,'  "  replied  Oliphant;  "I  want  to  find  out 
where  Miss  King  is,  if  I  can.  I'd  like  to  offer 
her  an  engagement  when  the  time  comes." 

"Miss  King?"  said  Blanche.  "Oh,  yes,  I  know! 
But  why — why  this  philanthropy?" 

"Who  is  Miss  King?"  asked  Otho.  He  found 
that  he  was  still  stroking  Blanche's  muff,  and 
he  put  it  aside.  "I  think  I'll  have  one  of  your 
cigarettes,  Royce." 

"There  they  are,  old  man,  behind  you.  Miss 
King  is  a  very  clever  woman.  'Philanthropy'? 
There's  no  philanthropy  about  it.  Where  does 
'philanthropy'  come  in?" 

"It's  a  blessed  word,  anyhow,"  murmured 
Otho,  inhaling — "like  'Mesopotamia.'  " 

"And  just  as  irrelevant,"  said  Oliphant.  "I 
want  to  offer  her  an  engagement  in  the  piece  be- 
cause I  don't  think  we  could  get  anybody  better." 

Blanche  laughed  shortly. 

"When  did  everyone  else  die?"  she  inquired. 
"How  very  absurd,  Royce — 'couldn't  get  any- 
body better'!     She's  a  provincial  actress,  Mr. 


270  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

Fairbairn,  who  fascinated  my  impressionable 
husband  by  the  genius  with  which  she  did  noth- 
ing at  some  matinee.  Engage  her,  my  dear  boy, 
by  all  means,  I'm  sure  I  don't  mind;  but  say  it's 
because  you  like  her,  not  because  you  couldn't 
get  anybody  better.  I  thought  we  were  to  have 
a  West  End  company — in  which  case  we  could 
get  a  good  many  people  better." 

"Then  I  am  going  to  engage  her  because  I  like 
her,"  answerd  Oliphant.  "But  for  Otho's  satis- 
faction, perhaps  you'll  permit  me  to  repeat  that 
she  has  talent;  I  shouldn't  suggest  casting  her 
for  'Astolaine'  if  I  weren't  sure  of  it." 

Otho  puffed  his  cigarette  a  shade  uncomfort- 
ably. 

"I  daresay  she'll  be  very  good,"  he  observed, 
eager  to  say  the  right  thing,  and  failing  signally. 
"  'Astolaine'  would  appeal  to  any  woman,  I 
should  sayl" 

"What  do  you  mean?"  exclaimed  Blanche. 
"Is  'Astolaine'  an  important  part,  Royce?" 

"  'Astolaine'  is  your  sister.  It's  not  a  long 
part — it's  the  most  important  woman's  part  after 
yours,  of  course;  in  fact,  it's  the  only  important 
woman's  part  besides  yours." 

She  looked  from  one  man  to  the  other  incredu- 
lously. 

"And  you're  going  to  give  it  to  a  woman  who 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  271 

isn't  known,"  she  demanded;  "to  a  woman  who 
has  never  spoken  twenty  lines  in  town?  What 
for?  I  don't  think  Mr.  Fairbairn  is  so  anxious 
to  save  five  pounds  a  week  on  the  salary  list ;  are 
you,  Mr.  Fairbairn?" 

"My  dear  Mrs.  Royce,"  he  stammered,  "you 
can  engage  whom  you  like — anybody  you  both 
decide  on — you  know  the  arrangements  have 
nothing  to  do  with  me  at  all." 

"We  shan't  save  anything  on  the  salary  list," 
said  Oliphant.  "Look  here,  Otho,  this  woman  is 
an  artist;  she'll  play  'Astolaine'  infinitely  better 
than  many  women  who  have  big  reputations. 
The  part  is  worth  about  ten  pounds  a  week,  and 
I  propose  to  pay  her  ten  pounds — always  pre- 
suming that  she  rehearses  it  satisfactorily.  Do 
you  object?" 

"Z  don't  object,"  said  Otho;  "certainly  not, 
old  chap.    I  don't  object  to  anything." 

"Then  if  I  can  learn  where  she  is,  I'll  write  to 
her — or  she  may  be  in  South  Africa,  or  Australia, 
when  she's  wanted." 

"But  there  is  no  philanthropy  about  it?"  cried 
Blanche  with  affected  amusement.  "You  are 
going  to  offer  her  the  best  chance  she  has  ever 
had,  and  the  best  salary,  and  there  is  no  philan- 
thropy about  it?  Why,  you  couldn't  do  any 
more  for  the  woman  if  you  were  in  her  debt!" 


272  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"I  am  in  her  debt,"  said  Oliphant;  "I  owe  her 
the  only  comfort  I  received  in  the  greatest  grief 
of  my  life." 

He  had  turned  pale ;  and  Blanche  also  changed 
colour,  though  she  could  only  conjecture  his 
meaning.  Fairbairn  wished  he  hadn't  come  in. 
It  seemed  to  him  that  Royce  had  created  a  serious 
discussion  out  of  a  playful  remonstrance.  Doubt- 
less every  married  couple  had  domestic  differ^ 
ences ;  but  the  illusion  had  existed  that  Oliphant 
and  his  wife  were  the  one  exception. 

When  he  went,  it  was  with  a  little  dismay,  and 
the  matter  recurred  to  him  during  the  evening 
while  he  was  at  work  on  the  translation.  The 
translation  was  far  from  being  a  task  to  be 
knocked  off  lightly  by  a  man  of  taste.  He  put 
down  his  pen  more  than  once,  and  questioned 
if,  with  the  ignorance  of  a  bachelor,  he  was  ex- 
aggerating the  suggestiveness  of  the  incident  that 
he  had  witnessed.  He  decided  that  he  was,  for 
Mrs.  Royce  was  too  charming  for  any  man  to 
be  unhappy  with  her ! 

Oliphant  had  not  continued  his  study  of  The 
Stage  after  his  friend's  departure,  nor  had 
Blanche  revived  the  subject  of  the  debate.  A 
diversion  had  been  effected  by  the  entrance  of 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Ellerton. 

The  novelist  had  evidently  come  with  a  pur- 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  273 

pose;  and  though  Oliphant  had  always  under- 
stood that  he  had  persistently  refused  invitations 
to  write  for  the  theatre,  it  transpired  that  in  the 
course  of  the  last  ten  years  he  had  written  several 
very  literary  dramas  without  any  invitation  at 
all. 

"It  occurred  to  me,"  he  said,  "that  your 
theatre  will  be  conducted  on  my  lines.  Now  I 
have  the  play  for  you.  And  I  have  brought 
it!" 

"I  should  like  to  read  it,"  answered  Oliphant ; 
"thanks.  Of  course  you  know  our  opening  pro- 
duction is  settled?  We  shall  probably  get  the 
Mayfair  from  next  September,  and  we  open  with 
Lacour's  God  and  the  State — we  shall  keep  to 
the  title :  God  and  the  State!" 

"I  heard  something  about  it  the  last  time 
Blanche  came;  I  didn't  know  you  had  actually 
settled.  Not  till  next  September?  Well,  you 
might  do  this  second." 

"The  next  piece  is  fixed  too.  Still,  if — if  it's 
suitable,  we  might  do  it  third  or  fourth." 

"It's  a  lovely  play,  Royce,"  said  Mrs.  Ellerton 
fervently;  "I'm  sure  you'll  like  it.  Blanche 
knows  it — don't  you,  dear? — The  Alienist.31 

"Oh  yes,"  said  Blanche,  "is  that  it?  Yes,  I 
remember  it."  Her  tone  was  not  enthusiastic, 
and  her  mother  repeated  nervously : 


274  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"If  you  read  it,  Royce,  I'm  quite  sure  you'll 
like  it.  The  hero's  and  heroine's  parts  are  both 
beautiful.    They  are  really!" 

"The  hero  and  heroine's,"  said  the  novelist. 
"How  often  have  I  told  you  that,  I  wonder!" 

"Yes,  dear,"  she  murmured,  "I'm  so  stupid;  I 
must  take  care!  They're  both  splendid,  Royce! 
And  the  scene  in  the  study,  where  he  discovers 
the  signs  of  insanity  in  his  own  wife,  and  you 
hear  the  dance-music  of  the  children's  quadrille 
in  the  next  room,  and  the  moonlight  is  streaming 
through  the  windows,  is  grand." 

"It  sounds  so,"  observed  Mr.  Ellerton,  "as 
you  describe  it;  'the  moonlight  streaming 
through  the  windows'  has  a  truly  literary  ring! 
Your  mother-in-law,  Royce,  is  an  estimable 
woman;  and  the  Editor  of  Winsome  Words ,  who 
will  be  one-and-twenty  next  birthday,  has  the 
highest  opinion  of  her  talent.  His  communica- 
tion this  week  is  really  most  flattering.  But  if 
she  told  you  the  story  of  a  work  of  Tolstoy's,  you 
might  think  you  were  listening  to  a  synopsis  of 
a  penny  novelette.  It's  very  remarkable.  She 
'sees  through  the  medium  of  a  temperament' — 
to  quote  Emile — and  her  temperament  is  of  the 
novelette,  noveletty!" 

This  was  one  of  the  speeches — delivered  with 
deliberation,  and  with  all  the  points  carefully 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  275 

emphasised — which  invariably  filled  Oliphant 
with  a  desire  to  kick  the  smiling  and  sarcastic 
gentleman ;  and  ostentatiously  ignoring  him  now, 
he  addressed  himself  to  the  poor  woman  who 
was  endeavouring  to  wear  an  easy  smile. 

"What  was  the  flattering  letter,  Mother?"  he 
asked. 

"Oh,  nothing,"  she  said.  "Only  a  few  lines 
with  the  cheque,  and  a  request  for  two  more 
stories.    When  are  you  coming  to  see  us  again?" 

"If  you  knew  how  busy  I  am!"  he  exclaimed 
apologetically.    "How  is  Gertrude?" 

"Yes,  how  is  Gertrude?"  said  Blanche;  "we 
must  really  try  to  run  out  one  afternoon  this 
week!  I  haven't  seen  her  for  an  age.  And  you 
know,  Royce,  we've  been  awfully  rude  to  Mrs. 
Le  Mesurier — we've  never  called  there  since  that 
luncheon  party.  And  there's  Lady  Liddington 
— we're  neglecting  everyone.  What  Lady  Fleck 
will  think  of  us  I  don't  know.  Do  tell  Gertie 
how  busy  we  are,  Mother!  Why  doesn't  she 
come  and  see  us?  Although,  as  we're  out  so 
much,  she'd  better  not  come  without  hearing 
from  me  first!" 

"You  are  becoming  more  fashionable  every 
day,  I  perceive,"  drawled  Mr.  Ellerton.  "The 
feted  favourites  of  Fortune." 

"Don't!"  she  sighed  languidly.     "The  bore  it 


276  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

is — if  one  could  only  be  quiet !  I  long  for  a  six- 
months  holiday  in  a  place  where  there  are  no 
visitors  and  no  invitation  cards.  Shall  I  ever  get 
it?  .  .  .  You're  going  to  stay,  aren't  you?" 

She  liked  them  to  stay  to  dinner  when  they 
came.  In  this  building,  too,  there  was  a  restau- 
rant downstairs,  and  it  gratified  her  to  cavil  in 
their  presence  at  a  cuisine  which  she  knew  they 
must  be  finding  epicurean.  As  a  rule  she  and 
Oliphant  dined  lightly,  but  when  her  family  re- 
mained, she  ordered  four  or  five  courses,  and 
was  chagrined  if  his  refusal  of  chartreuse  be- 
trayed that  they  did  not  have  liqueurs  every 
evening. 

Oliphant  repeated  his  assurance  that  he  would 
read  The  Alienist — which  might  be  a  good  play 
handicapped  by  a  bad  title — and  the  author 
obviously  considered  that  perusal  implied  accept- 
ance, for  his  manner  became  quite  genial  before 
the  hour  arrived  for  the  husband  and  wife  to 
betake  themselves  to  their  respective  stages. 
When  the  promise  was  fulfilled,  however,  Royce 
found  that  the  drama  possessed  all  the  faults  of 
Mr.  Mundey's ;  and  he  was  for  the  first  time  pro- 
foundly thankful  that  he  hadn't  married  a  de- 
voted daughter. 

Alma,  whom  he  had  not  seen  since  they  parted 
at  Brighton,  was  discovered  to  be  on  tour  with 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  277 

the  Hamiltons,  and  having  ascertained  her 
whereabouts,  he  said  to  Blanche: 

"By  the  way,  I  see  Miss  King  is  at  Rochdale 
this  week.  We  grew  rather  heated  the  other  day 
about  nothing.  Of  course  I  don't  want  her  in 
the  theatre  against  your  wishes,  but  if  she  proves 
as  good  as  anybody  else,  I  suppose  you've  really 
nothing  against  the  arrangement,  have  you?" 

Blanche  shrugged  her  shoulders. 

"Why  should  I  have?"  she  said,  not  un- 
amiably.    "If  she  is  good,  engage  her!" 

Oliphant  wrote  to  Alma  the  same  day,  a  letter, 
which  gave  him  a  glow  of  happiness.  He  told 
her  that  in  all  probability  he  and  his  wife  would 
open  the  Mayfair  towards  the  end  of  the  follow- 
ing year,  and  that  he  hoped  she  would  be  free 
to  come  to  them.  The  sentence  in  which  he  men- 
tioned the  word  "salary"  was  a  little  difficult  to 
phrase,  for  while  he  was  delighted  to  put  money 
in  her  pocket,  he  hated  to  have  to  talk  about  it. 
It  was  the  first  time  he  had  written  to  her,  and 
he  was  surprised,  when  he  had  finished,  to  see 
that  he  had  covered  six  pages.  But  there  had 
been  so  much  to  say  about  the  piece,  and  his  cer- 
tainty that  she  would  feel  the  part. 

Her  reply  was  briefer,  but  he  seemed  to  hear 
her  speaking.  "Can  I  say  anything  more  than 
'Thank  you  with  all  my  heart'?"  she  wrote.    Yet 


278  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

she  had  found  more  to  say;  and  almost  he  could 
divine  where  she  had  paused  with  the  sudden 
fear  that  her  pen  was  running  away  with  her. 

It  was  already  close  upon  Christmas,  and  soon 
the  Hamiltons'  tour  must  be  ending.  He  would 
have  liked  to  ask  Alma  to  call  upon  him  and 
Blanche  when  she  returned  to  town,  but  shrank 
now  from  speaking  of  her  any  more  than  he  was 
compelled.  When  Christmas  came,  he  momen- 
tarily entertained  the  idea  of  going  to  Burton 
Crescent,  in  the  hope  that  she  might  be  staying 
there  again.  But  it  would  not  be  quite  the  thing ! 
He  dismissed  the  notion. 

The  contract  for  the  Mayfair  was  signed  in 
January;  and  after  that  the  poet's  progress  with 
Lacour's  play,  and  the  models  of  the  scenes,  and 
a  score  of  matters  demanding  attention  crowded 
thick  upon  one  another's  heels. 

With  the  knowledge  that  they  would  crowd 
more  thickly  still  as  the  year  advanced,  Oliphant 
sometimes  wondered  what  time  the  business  cares 
of  theatrical  management  would  leave  him  to 
remember  that  he  was  an  actor  too. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

Blanche  had  considered  that  the  auditorium 
was  shabby.  She  had  stood  between  Otho  and 
Oliphant  in  the  stalls  one  morning,  and  plucked 
disconsolately  at  a  loose  piece  of  gimp  on  one  of 
the  chairs.  On  the  way  back  to  the  flat,  it  had 
been  apparent  that  she  longed  to  see  them  newly 
upholstered  before  the  theatre  was  opened,  and 
when  Otho  suggested  their  renovation,  the  de- 
lighted smile  that  lit  her  face  had  answered  him 
before  she  spoke.  There  had  been  a  cheerful 
discussion  about  the  material  to  be  used,  Oliphant 
and  she  holding  different  views.  Otho  inclined 
to  the  opinion  that  the  more  effective  scheme 
would  be  the  one  advocated  by  Blanche,  and 
thenceforward  she  had  had  further  ideas  on  the 
subject  daily. 

He  spent  eight  hundred  pounds  in  gratifying 
her  whims — if  he  had  had  a  long  lease,  he  would 
have  had  the  house  redecorated — and  behind  the 
curtain  the  services  of  the  best  scenic  artists  had 
been  sought,  and  the  company  boldly  organised. 

279 


280  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

The  salary  list,  indeed,  was  much  higher  than 
the  figure  at  which  it  had  been  originally  esti- 
mated, but  the  dress-rehearsal  amply  justified 
the  selections  that  had  been  made.  Every  part 
was  rendered  well,  and  even  Blanche  did  not 
deny  that  Alma  as  "Astolaine"  was  very  good. 

Otho  echoed  the  pronouncement.  He  and 
Blanche  sat  in  the  rehabilitated  stalls  during  the 
scenes  in  which  she  could  escape  from  the  stage, 
watching  the  progress  of  the  rehearsal  together. 
He  found  the  evening  very  interesting;  and 
although  he  was  depressed  when  the  thunder  or 
lightning  came  at  the  wrong  moments,  the 
frenzy  that  such  blunders  begot,  and  the  excited 
altercations  that  ensued,  added  a  strong  element 
of  humour  to  his  inexperience.  There  was  a 
fascination,  too,  in  sitting  beside  Blanche,  swayed 
by  the  same  interests,  and  exchanging  criticisms 
with  her.  The  strangeness  of  the  woman's  attire, 
her  accentuated  eyebrows,  and  the  colour  on  her 
cheeks,  all  emphasised  the  novelty  of  the  situa- 
tion; and  once,  in  commenting  on  the  sleeves 
of  her  costume,  when  she  took  his  hand  and 
passed  it  down  her  arm,  he  felt  a  wave  of  emotion 
which  a  few  months  earlier  would  have  astonished 
him. 

Of  a  truth,  Otho  had  awakened  to  the  fact  that 
he  admired  Blanche  more  than  was  desirable — 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  281 

not  for  his  own  peace,  but  for  ethics.  His  mental 
state  was  so  very  undefined  that  it  permitted 
him  to  assure  himself  that  he  was  supersensitive 
and  absurd  to  see  anything  wrong  in  it.  Never- 
theless, perceiving  that  he  was  regarding  his 
friend's  wife  somewhat  differently  from  the  way 
in  which  he  would  have  wished  to  regard  her, 
there  had  been  one  or  two  occasions  on  which  he 
had  not  failed  to  be  distressed. 

There  was  no  room  for  distress  in  his  mind, 
however,  on  the  following  night.  He  was  in- 
fected by  the  fever  that  pervaded  the  menage  in 
Green  Street — where  Blanche  and  Oliphant  had 
obtained  a  furnished  house.  As  he  took  his  seat 
in  his  box,  he  was  reminded  of  the  sensations 
with  which  he  had  sometimes  entered  a  grand- 
stand. Royce,  who  was  looking  tired  and  ill, 
had  been  in  the  theatre  till  late  in  the  afternoon, 
and  then  driven  home,  to  snatch  a  hasty  meal, 
and  endeavour  to  rest.  The  curtain  rose  on  God 
and  the  State  at  eight  o'clock,  and  by  8.30  a 
fashionable  audience  had  assembled  in  the  May- 
fair  Theatre.  The  pit  had  ceased  to  cry  "Ssh!" 
and  it  was  no  longer  necessary  for  people  to  keep 
rising  in  order  that  late-comers,  who  showed  no 
consciousness  of  their  discourtesy,  might  pass 
them. 

The  actor-manager's  nervousness  was  pain- 


282  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

fully  apparent  during  his  first  lines,  but  Blanche 
had  her  voice  under  better  control.  After  Royce, 
the  artist  whose  nervousness  was  most  visible  was 
Alma,  passionately  eager  to  justify  Oliphant's 
faith  in  her.  Otho  fancied  he  could  detect 
through  his  glasses  that  her  lips  trembled. 

The  atmosphere  seemed  to  gather  spirit  by 
degrees,  and  his  craving  for  a  strong  whisky-and- 
soda  and  a  cigarette  grew  less  intense.  But  he 
remarked  for  the  first  time  how  cold  at  its  best 
was  his  acquaintances'  well-bred  attitude  towards 
a  theatrical  performance;  and  then  with  an 
anxiety  which  he  had  never  imagined  that 
journalists  could  be  capable  of  inspiring  under 
his  shirt-front,  he  glanced  speculatively  at  the 
rows  of  Press  men,  and  at  a  box  opposite,  where 
one  critic  sat  alone. 

The  curtain  fell  at  twenty  minutes'  past  eleven, 
and  a  number  of  the  fashionable  audience  that 
had  come  in  late,  trooped  through  the  pass-door 
to  the  stage,  where  Blanche  was  a  triumphant 
hostess.  The  play,  they  exclaimed,  was  a 
"dream,"  it  was  "sweet,"  it  was  "quite  too  de- 
lightful upon  their  honour."  Where  the  poetry 
had  been  spoken  there  was  now  a  gush  of  in- 
sincere congratulation.  Many  of  the  smiling 
visitors  thought  the  performance  dreadfully  dull, 
as  did  the  majority  of  the  pit  and  gallery,  who 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  283 

had  coughed  and  shuffled  with  irritating  fre- 
quency during  some  of  the  scenes.  But  in  the 
flow  of  felicitation,  six  months  was  the  shortest 
run  that  anybody  permitted  himself  to  prophesy. 

However,  most  of  the  notices  could  be  called 
favourable  to  the  production.  Some  insisted  that 
Lacour  was  a  lyric  poet,  and  not  a  dramatist, 
limiting  their  approval  to  the  way  the  work  had 
been  Englished,  and  the  manner  in  which  it  was 
played;  a  few  praised  it  unreservedly.  There 
were  plenty  of  excerpts  to  be  made  for  advertis- 
ing purposes,  "the  good  quotable  line"  being 
absent  only  from  the  opinions  of  the  novices,  who 
were  learning  syntax  by  "criticising"  for  the 
least  important  periodicals.  It  now  remained  to 
be  seen  how  God  and  the  State  would  be  sup- 
ported by  the  public. 

Blanche  and  Otho  were  sanguine,  though  the 
receipts  were  not  immediately  all  that  could  be 
wished ;  they  whom  misgivings  already  oppressed 
were  Oliphant,  and  the  woman  whom  the  Press 
had  agreed  to  describe  as  "an  actress  of  con- 
spicuous ability,  hitherto  unknown  to  London." 
Every  evening  when  he  came  off,  in  the  first  act, 
by  the  door  at  which  she  was  waiting  to  make  her 
earliest  entrance,  Alma  looked  an  inquiry,  and 
he  stopped  to  answer  it.  But  there  was  really 
no  need  for  him  to  say  that  the  house  was  bad 


284  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

again — she  could  read  it  in  his  face;  nor  did  it 
need  words  from  her  to  tell  him  that  she  was  the 
only  person  who  understood  how  much  he  had  at 
stake. 

Between  these  two,  whom  life,  which  has  no 
construction  and  no  moral,  had  once  thrown 
together,  and  speedily  separated — who  had  met 
again  by  chance  when  the  weaker  one  was  mar- 
ried, and  been  again  divided  by  circumstances 
until  the  man's  purpose  brought  the  woman  into 
his  own  theatre — there  had  always  been  a  sym- 
pathy, which  now  grew  stronger  daily.  Daily, 
Oliphant  looked  forward  with  greater  eagerness 
to  their  next  conversation,  and  remembered  more 
vividly  their  preceding  one.  And  meanwhile  his 
home  became  less  and  less  congenial.  Blanche 
with  a  well-appointed  house  in  a  fashionable 
quarter,  did  not  allow  her  opportunities  to  be 
fettered  by  the  theatre  receipts.  She  had  re- 
moved to  Green  Street  in  order  to  entertain,  and 
she  was  resolved  to  fulfil  her  intention.  Her 
social  functions  seemed  to  him  incessant,  and 
from  any  one  of  them  the  actor-manager  would 
joyfully  have  escaped  to  take  his  way  to  the 
lodgings  in  Bloomsbury  that  held  Alma.  He 
knew  no  more  of  her  lodgings  than  their  address, 
for  she  had  not  been  asked  to  Green  Street. 

That  his  wife  had  omitted  to  invite  her  wa9 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  285 

due  to  indifference,  and  not  to  any  objection  to 
Royce's  conversations  with  Miss  King.  Their 
conversations,  since  he  had  proclaimed  that  they 
were  such  devoted  friends,  she  found  natural 
enough.  Moreover,  she  would  have  been  un- 
willing to  do  him  the  honour  of  evincing  jealousy, 
unless  there  had  been  a  scandal  which  compelled 
her  to  insist  that  the  other  woman,  whoever  she 
might  be,  should  leave  the  theatre.  Blanche  was 
too  much  elated  to  be  jealous.  True,  the  business 
remained  bad,  but  her  passion  for  paragraphs 
was  now  gratified  abundantly,  and  at  the  worst, 
God  and  the  State  would  prove  a  failure.  Kirt- 
land's  drama  would  be  a  hit,  she  supposed — his 
name  alone  was  a  draw — and  then  the  failure 
would  be  retrieved.  But  she  was  sorry  for  Otho, 
because  to  him  there  hadn't  been  any  benefit 
whatever  from  the  venture.  He  was  so  "gentle- 
manly about  the  returns!"  And  really  it  was 
"something  to  be  looked  at  again  by  a  man  who 
was  in  love  with  her!  Of  course  there  were 
plenty  of  men  who  tried  to  look  as  if  they  were — 
through  monocles  in  every  drawing-room.  But 
that  was  only  because  she  was  on  the  stage,  and 
with  the  ignorance  of  the  outsider,  they  thought 
that  all  actresses  were  to  be  had.  Otho  was 
really  in  love  with  her.  Poor  fellow,  how  happy 
he  would  have  been  as  her  husband!" 


286  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

A  woman's  reflections  cannot  progress  so  far 
as  this  without  her  manner  altering  towards  the 
man;  and  it  was  when  Blanche's  manner  first 
altered,  that  Otho  perceived  with  poignant  self- 
reproach  that  he  could  no  longer  apply  salve  to 
his  conscience  by  the  terms  "supersensitive"  and 
"absurd."  He  was  at  this  period  strong  enough 
to  leave  London,  if  there  had  been  no  reason  for 
his  remaining,  but  he  was  weak  enough  to  find 
sufficient  reason  in  his  interest  in  the  Mayfair. 
Unable  now  to  deny  his  sentiments,  he  to-day 
assuaged  remorse  by  assuring  himself  that  they 
didn't  matter,  because  she  would  never  know. 

That  he  must  sustain  a  heavy  loss  by  the  initial 
production  was  speedily  apparent,  and  it  was 
decided  that  Kirtland's  drama  should  be  put  into 
rehearsal  when  God  and  the  State  had  been  run- 
ning three  weeks.  Oliphant  felt  needlessly 
guilty,  but  he  was  confident  that  they  were  now 
about  to  rehearse  a  work  which  would  attract  all 
London. 

Kirtland,  being  a  dramatist  with  a  literary 
reputation  and  an  independence,  had  reached  the 
point  where  he  could  afford  to  be  courageous, 
and  as  he  was  a  writer  of  brilliant  ability,  his 
courage  had  fascinating  results.  Already  he  had 
written  two  plays  of  psychological  interest  which 
had  been  great  artistic  successes,  and  in  The 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  287 

Average  Man  he  had  at  last  dared  to  say  all  he 
thought.  Had  he  deliberately  sat  down  to  con- 
trovert Theophile  Gautier's  dictum  that  the 
theatre  never  becomes  possessed  of  an  idea  until 
fiction  has  worn  it  threadbare,  he  could  not  have 
made  a  bolder  experiment.  To  Oliphant  it  ap- 
peared to  be  one  that  would  emancipate  the  Eng- 
lish stage  and  make  an  epoch. 

He  had  lent  the  manuscript  to  Alma,  and  he 
awaited  her  opinion  more  anxiously  than  he  had 
asked  for  Otho's;  far  more  anxiously  than  he 
had  asked  his  wife's. 

"It's  magnificent,"  she  said.  "I  don't  know 
if  his  view  is  right,  but  it's  a  view  to  hear,  and  to 
think  about.  And  the  dialogue — the  grip  of  it! 
Did  you  say  I  was  to  play  'Mrs.  Ivery'?" 

"I  hope  you  like  the  part?"  He  believed  that 
she  would  have  played  the  heroine's  better,  but 
naturally  Blanche  must  have  that,  though  she 
would  not  be  so  subtle  in  it. 

She  read  his  thought,  as  she  read  all  he  had. 
"I  like  it  very  much,"  she  replied  quickly.  "I 
like  my  part,  and  I  admire  the  play — it's  worthy 
of  the  Dream  Theatre.  Oh,  please  Heaven,  it 
will  be  all  right !    I  pray  for  it." 

"Our  Dream  Theatre  has  opened  badly,"  he 
said. 

She  nodded.    "But  it  will  come!" 


288  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"With  this?" 

"I  think  so." 

"You  need  never  go  back  to  four  or  five 
pounds  a  week  in  the  provinces  anyhow  l"  ex- 
claimed Oliphant,  after  a  pause. 

"Ah,  don't  say  'anyhow'  I  And  I  wasn't  think- 
ing of  myself  when  I  said  that  I  prayed." 

"I  know.    Only  I'm  glad,  at  least,  that " 

"You  will  have  much  more  to  be  glad  about. 
But  I  thank  you.  You've  done  a  great  deal  for 
me,  Mr.  Oliphant — I  shall  never  forget  it  as  long 
as  I  live." 

"I  don't  want  your  thanks,"  he  said;  "I  hate 
your  thanks.  If  you've  talent,  thank  God  for 
it — I  didn't  give  it  to  you.  I  want  your  friend- 
ship; and  every  time  you  'thank'  me  you  make 
me  a  stranger  to  you." 

When  her  cue  came,  Oliphant  went  down  to 
his  dressing-room,  realising,  as  he  had  realised 
before,  that  he  had  uttered  a  he.  It  was  not  her 
friendship  that  he  wanted,  but  her  love.  He 
loved  her.  He  loved  the  timbre  of  her  voice,  and 
the  comprehension  of  her  silence,  and  inanimate 
things  that  she  had  hallowed  by  her  touch.  He 
loved  her  with  the  mind  that  she  had  dominated 
and  the  soul  that  was  rendered  greater  by  his 
love.  He  loved  her  too  truly  ever  to  tell  her  the 
truth.    Again  a  man  believed  that  he  could  love 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  289 

without  the  woman  knowing  it.  If  he  had  been 
free,  and  could  have  won  her,  triumphs  would 
have  been  transfigured  and  failures  robbed  of 
their  sting;  if  he  had  been  free,  he  would  have 
won  her,  and  life  could  hold  no  more  than  that! 
Once  happiness  had  been  within  his  reach,  and 
he  had  blundered  by  it.  To-day  he  looked  back, 
empty-handed,  from  a  celibacy  that  had  no 
rights.  But  though  he  could  never  touch  her 
lips,  she  was  his  Ideal;  and  that  he  might  be 
worthy  to  worship  her  he  would  always  be  faith- 
ful to  his  wife.  Temptation  was  not  avoiding 
him — it  was  in  the  front  of  his  theatre  often,  and 
in  his  own  house,  and  in  the  drawing-rooms  of 
others;  but  to  Oliphant  it  had  seemed  that  to 
break  his  marriage-oath  would  make  him  guilty, 
not  towards  Blanche,  not  towards  God,  but 
towards  Alma  King.  Lowered  by  an  intrigue, 
he  could  not  have  met  her  eyes.  Herself  he 
would  not  have  taken  had  she  been  willing  to 
come  to  him — and  he  would  not  insult  her  by 
accepting  anything  less. 


CHAPTER  XIX 

The  Average  Man  was  eulogised  by  those 
organs  which  embody  the  views  of  the  critical 
for  the  delectation  of  the  cultured ;  it  was  received 
with  respect  by  the  entire  Press ;  it  was  even  com- 
mented on  by  the  public.  It  did  not,  of  course, 
excite  the  interest  aroused  by  a  football  match, 
but  its  thesis  was  mentioned;  there  were  a  great 
many  people  in  London  who  said  "Fancy!" 

However,  though  Oliphant  had  continued  to 
play  it  for  two  months,  and  hoped  against  hope, 
the  drama  was  a  financial  failure,  and  this  time 
Blanche  was  not  a  whit  less  anxious  than  he, 
for  the  rent,  and  the  servants,  and  the  cost  of  her 
luncheon  and  dinner  parties,  swelled  the  house- 
hold expenses  to  a  sum  which  was  by  no  means 
covered  by  her  and  Royce's  salary.  Besides 
being  anxious,  she  was  incensed,  for  the  less 
ardent  of  the  newspapers  had  questioned  whether 
the  subject  was  one  "calculated  to  attract  the 
general  playgoer,  who,  as  we  have  often  insisted, 
seeks  before  all  things  to  be  amused,"  etc.,  and 
she  blamed  Royce  bitterly  for  his  lack  of  judg- 

290 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  291 

merit.  She  might  have  foreseen  the  issue,  she 
felt :  she  had  obtained  a  theatre  for  him,  and  now 
his  idiosyncrasies  were  going  to  ruin  theml 

Otho  had  denied  himself  Green  Street  for 
more  than  a  fortnight  when  he  came  one  morning 
in  response  to  a  note  from  her.  It  was  not  acci- 
dental that  he  found  her  alone,  for  she  had  ap- 
pointed the  morning. 

"I'm  frightfully  worried,"  she  declared  when 
he  had  lighted  a  cigarette.  "Don't  I  look  dread- 
ful? Don't  I?  I  feel  a  hundred.  You  know 
you  must  be  firm !  You  promised  me  you  would 
be.  I  told  you  six  weeks  ago  that  this  thing  was 
a  frost.  Now  Royce  is  considering  a  play  that's 
simply  fore-doomed,  and  he  says  he  has  talked 
to  you  about  it.  You  should  object!  You  must 
tell  him  that  you  want  your  theatre  to  pay." 

"Royce  wants  it  to  pay,  you  know,"  he  said 
uneasily;  "I — I  can't  very  well  take  an  attitude 

that  looks  like It's  nobody's  fault  up  to  the 

present,  is  it  ?  The  pieces  have  been  good  enough, 
Heaven  knows!" 

"I've  warned  you,"  she  sighed;  "I  can't  do  any 
more.  But,  I  tell  you,  I  feel  simply  miserable 
when  I  think  what  you've  lost — if  it  hadn't  been 
for  me  we  shouldn't  have  had  the  theatre!" 

"Oh,  don't  talk  like  that;  we  shall  have  a  big 
success  directly,  and " 


292  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"Never,"  she  said  emphatically.  "Believe  me, 
Mr.  Fairbairn,  'never'!  It's  a  fact.  Unless 
Royce  is  checked — if  you  don't  make  a  stand — 
we  shall  have  one  failure  after  another.  I  see  it. 
It  will  mean  thousands  to  you,  and  it  will  mean — 
well,  I  don't  know  what  it  will  mean  to  us!  The 
Bankruptcy  Court  I  suppose!  We  can't  go  on 
like  this  long." 

"I  was  afraid  your  affairs  couldn't  be  alto- 
gether roseate ;  I've  been  thinking  about  it.  I — 
if — of  course  if  there  has  been  bad  judgment,  it's 
been  as  much  mine  as  Royce's,  and — and  it's  only 
right  that  I  should  share  the  responsibility.  I 
must  have  a  chat  with  him.  There  needn't  be 
any  duns,  Mrs.  Royce." 

"Do  you  think  I'd  let  Royce  borrow  money 
from  you?"  she  exclaimed.  "Yes,  I  know,  you'd 
lend  it  gladly — you'd  do  anything  for  us  I  be- 
lieve !  but  I  wouldn't  let  him  take  it.  And  besides 
I  couldn't  if  I  wanted  to." 

"Why?    How  do  you  mean  you  'couldn't'?" 

"Because  Royce  doesn't  quite  know  the  state 
we  are  in.    And  I  don't  want  to  tell  him." 

"It  needn't  botner  him  if  he  can  put  things 
straight.  It  would  be  only  a  loan.  When  the 
success  does  come " 

"I  didn't  mean  because  he'd  be  bothered,"  she 
said;  "at  least,  not  only  that.    You  see  I  insisted 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  293 

on  this  house,  and  asked  the  people  here,  and 
made  the  debts.  I  did  it  for  the  best;  the  policy 
was  right  enough — if  the  business  had  been 
decent,  there  wouldn't  have  been  any  trouble; 
but  Z'm  the  'culprit'!  I  don't  want  Royce  to 
turn  round  on  me — as  he  would — and  reproach 
me.    That  would  be  the  last  straw!" 

"Oh,"  cried  Otho,  "how  could  he  reproach  you? 
He  wouldn't!" 

Her  eyebrows  rose.  "Wouldn't  he?  But  it 
isn't  a  question  of  money.  I  only  want  you  to 
exert  your  authority,  to  have  the  theatre  con- 
ducted on  proper  lines.  There's  a  piece  now  in 
Paris  just  produced — a  piece  of  Reybaud's; 
there's  a  notice  of  it  in  The  Era  this  week.  It 
could  be  bought,  it  could  be  adapted,  and  might 
make  a  fortune  for  us.  But  no!  Royce  wants 
a  'masterpiece'  that  is  going  to  bring  us  to  the 
workhouse  instead.  Oh,  it  drives  me  mad  to 
think  about  it!" 

"Why  not  speak  to  him  of  Reybaud's  piece?" 
suggested  Otho.  "Z  couldn't  urge  it  much  be- 
cause I'm  no  judge;  but  you — you  might  pro- 
pose it,  and  use  your  influence  with  Royce." 

''Influence'?"  she  echoed.  "Do  you  really 
imagine  that  I've  any  influence  with  Royce?" 
She  laughed.    "Why,  my  dear  boy;  I've  no  more 


294  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

influence  over  Royce  than  I  have  over  the  Prime 
Minister!" 

"Do  you  mean  that "    He  looked  at  her 

incredulously.  "Do  you  mean  that  your  advice 
— your  request — would  have  no  weight  with  him? 
Wouldn't  he  pay  any  attention  to  it?" 

"Certainly  not,"  she  said.  She  met  the  young 
man's  startled  eyes  for  some  seconds  signifi- 
cantly. Then  in  a  quiet  voice,  and  without  lower- 
ing her  gaze,  she  added:  "Royce  and  I  have  been 
strangers  for  more  than  two  years." 

In  the  silence  that  followed  Otho  stared 
dizzily  at  the  fire.  The  suddenness  with  which 
she  had  leapt  the  limits  of  conventional  parlance 
gave  him  a  sensation  resembling  fright,  and  he 
could  think  of  no  words  for  answer.  At  last  he 
stammered  with  an  effort: 

"Of  course  I'll  try  to  do  what  you  wish,  with 
pleasure.  I'm  awfully  grieved  to  hear  that 
things  are  wrong ;  I  always  thought  that  you  and 
he  were  so  happy  together." 

She  smiled  faintly,  a  little  to  one  side,  her 
nether-lip  indented  by  her  teeth. 

"I'm  the  loneliest  woman  in  the  world." 

The  compassion  on  his  face  was  delicious  to 
her,  and,  watching  him,  she  was  sincerely  sorry 
for  herself.  Words  now  thronged  his  mind  only 
too  insistently,  and  he  sat  torn  between  the  desire 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  295 

to  tell  her  how  deeply  he  sympathised  with  her, 
and  the  knowledge  that  if  he  obeyed  the  impulse, 
he  would  surely  say  something  that  would  make 
it  impossible  for  him  to  take  Oliphant's  hand 
any  more. 

"Don't  look  like  that,"  she  murmured.  "It 
doesn't  matter." 

"What  can  I  say?"  he  exclaimed.  "It's  so 
hard  for  a  man  to  show  a  woman  whom  he 
mustn't — who  is  no  relation  to  him  that  he's 
sorry  for  her!" 

"You  needn't  say  anything — I  know  you're 
sorry." 

"It  wasn't  two  years  ago  that  we  had  our  first 
talk  about  the  theatre,"  he  said  after  another 
pause. 

"No,"  she  said,  "I  know." 

"And  you  were  then ?" 

She  nodded.  "But  I  was  fond  of  him  still  and 
ambitious  for  him.  A  woman  doesn't  become 
indifferent  all  at  once." 

His  eyes  filled.  She  seemed  to  him  all  that 
was  noble  and  strong  to  endure. 

"Ah,  don't!  Ah,  Silly  Billy,"  she  said  half 
playfully,  half  tenderly,  "you  mustn't!" 

Otho  turned  aside,  and  lit  another  cigarette 
with  fingers  that  trembled  a  little. 


296  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"You've  cut  me  up  horribly,"  he  muttered.  "I 
wish  to  God  I  could  do  something  for  you!" 

"You  have,  with  your  friendship.  I  don't 
know  anybody  I  could  have  talked  to  like  this 
but  you." 

"We  are  friends,  aren't  we?"  he  asked.  "We 
always  shall  be?" 

"I'm  sure  we  shall!" 

"Well,  let  me  do  what  I  suggested  just  now," 
he  said  eagerly.  "I  don't  mean  to  let  me  speak 
to  Royce  about  it,  but  to  arrange  it  with  you. 
It  isn't  much,  but  I  shan't  feel  so  infernally  use- 
less. If  you'll  only  give  me  an  idea  of  the  sum, 
I'll  post  a  cheque  this  afternoon.  Will  you?  Let 
me  put  an  end  to  your  money  worries,  do !" 

He  had  fulfilled  a  hope  that  had  awakened  in 
her  ten  minutes  ago.  It  had  then  occurred  to 
her  that  the  loan  made  to  herself  privately  would 
dispose  of  the  difficulties,  and  spare  her  the  un- 
pleasantness of  owning  their  full  extent  to 
Oliphant;  but  now,  while  her  perception  of  the 
circumstances  remained  quite  as  acute,  sentiment 
forbade  her  to  take  advantage  of  the  young 
man's  love  for  her.  She  would  have  done  it  ten, 
five,  two  minutes  ago — but  the  tears  had  come 
into  his  eyes  about  her.    She  shook  her  head. 

And  his  persuasions  failed  to  move  her  out- 
wardly, though  inwardly  she  wavered  often,  and 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  297 

hoped  he  would  believe  her  obdurate  before  she 
lost  her  footing  on  these  unaccustomed  heights. 
When  he  had  gone,  regretful,  she  thought  of  him 
with  admiration  for  having  raised  her  so  much 
in  her  self-esteem. 

To  complete  Oliphant's  unhappiness,  and  to 
darken  his  outlook,  it  had  needed  only  that  he 
should  be  required  to  stultify  the  expressed  pur- 
pose for  which  a  theatre  had  been  taken.  By 
Blanche's  arguments  that  they  could  not  be 
popular  socially  unless  the  receipts  enabled  them 
to  entertain,  he  had  been  uninfluenced — he  did 
not  seek  social  popularity;  and  between  reaping 
the  profit  that  would  content  her,  and  justifying 
Fairbairn's  experiment,  there  was  a  wide  differ- 
ence. He  had  been  firm  in  the  face  of  their 
increasing  liabilities,  merely  praying  that  their 
expenditure  might  in  future  be  reduced;  he  had 
been  as  resolute  as  he  could  be  as  an  actor- 
manager  with  a  backer.  But  when  the  backer 
joined  forces  with  the  actor-manager's  wife, 
confidence  collapsed. 

Nevertheless  the  artist  did  not  succumb  im- 
mediately; he  proposed  Shakespeare  as  a  com- 
promise. In  London,  if  not  in  the  provinces, 
he  urged,  Shakespeare  could  be  made  to  pay, 
ameliorated  by  elaborate  scenery,  as  a  powder 
by  a  tablespoonful  of  jam.     Shakespeare  might 


298  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

prove  successful,  and  Shakespeare  would  be  art. 
But  Blanche  did  not  want  to  play  Shakespeare, 
and  she  harped  on  Felix  Reybaud's  La  Curieuse, 
the  latest  product  of  a  playwright  who  was 
sincere  in  nothing  but  his  desire  to  tickle  the 
public  taste;  a  piece  which  owed  its  success  in 
Paris,  not  to  its  characterisation,  not  to  any 
insight  into  life,  but  to  a  gratuitous  immorality 
and  'le  doigte  du  dramaturge." 

Oliphant  shrank  from  confessing  this  new 
trouble  to  Alma;  he  felt  that  it  would  be  soon 
enough  to  speak  of  defeat  when  he  had  agreed 
to  surrender.  But  for  the  first  time  Blanche 
suspected  that  she  was  encouraging  his  views. 
Umbrage  had  already  been  taken  at  several  of 
the  Press  notices,  which  had  intimated  that 
"Miss  King's  acting  had  the  rare  and  indefinable 
quality  of  intellectuality,"  the  word  "rare"  being 
found  an  insult  by  implication.  Originally  one 
critic  had  said  it;  but  there  had  poured  in  a 
multitude  of  cuttings  from  newspapers  published 
in  almost  every  county  in  the  kingdom,  and  as 
some  of  the  obscurer  journals  inserted  the  Lon- 
don criticisms  verbatim  as  the  opinions  of  im- 
aginary Correspondents,  the  manageress  had  had 
the  anoyance  of  reading  the  objectionable  sen- 
tence more  than  once.  The  suspicion  now 
aroused  in  her  increased  the  disfavour  with  which 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  299 

she  had  begun  to  regard  Miss  King.  And  as 
a  culminating  offence,  Alma  chanced,  on  the 
evening  of  the  discussion,  to  receive  some  ap- 
plause at  a  point  where  hitherto  there  had  not 
been  any.  The  scene  was  one  between  her  and 
Blanche,  who  stood  for  two  or  three  seconds  at 
a  disadvantage.  It  was  resentfully  referred  to 
directly  they  were  together  in  the  wings. 

"What  was  the  meaning  of  that  round,  Miss 
King?  You've  never  had  a  hand  there  till  to- 
night?" 

"I  was  surprised  myself,"  answered  Alma. 
"But  I  think  I  felt  the  lines  more  than  usual." 

"Well,  the  next  time  you're  going  to  feel  them 
perhaps  you'll  let  me  know!"  said  Blanche 
sharply.  "I  don't  want  to  be  put  out  by  your 
applause  again!" 

But  her  irritation  was  too  complex  to  evapo- 
rate in  a  rebuke.  To  herself  she  said  that  since 
King's  influence  was  supporting  Royce  in  his 
folly,  she  shouldn't  remain  at  the  Mayfair.  Mo- 
mentarily she  questioned  if  she  was  mistaking 
the  nature  of  the  influence.  But  no ;  she  did  not 
think  that!  Royce  was  deceiving  her  doubtless, 
but  not  with  King;  and  the  credit,  she  should 
imagine,  was  the  woman's. 

Creditable,  or  not,  however,  she  did  not  want 
her  in  the  company,  and  she  trusted  that  La 


300  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

Curieuse,  if  they  secured  it,  would  prove  to  con- 
tain no  part  for  her.  The  argument  about  the 
piece  was  repeated  in  Green  Street  the  following 
afternoon.  Otho  was  lunching  there,  and  Oli- 
phant  again  dwelt  upon  his  wish  to  revive  a 
Shakespearian  play. 

"But  Mrs.  Royce  doesn't  care  for  the  idea," 
said  Otho.  "What  is  your  objection  to  Rey- 
baud?  I  always  understood  that  he  was  first- 
rate." 

"Well,  of  course  he  is!"  Blanche  exclaimed. 
"We  mayn't  be  able  to  get  the  thing  if  we  try — 
there'll  be  twenty  people  after  it.  Reybaud? 
If  Reybaud  hasn't  a  great  reputation,  I'm  an 
amateur,  Royce,  I  know  nothing  about  the  stage. 
Who  in  Paris  has,  then?" 

"It  depends  what  you  mean  by  'reputation,'  " 
said  Oliphant  wearily.  "His  name  is  very  widely 
known;  the  crowd  think  him  a  very  clever  man. 
If  that  is  'reputation,'  you're  quite  right." 

"Well,  I  should  certainly  say  it  was!"  she 
answered.  She  glanced  at  Otho:  "Wouldn't 
you?" 

"I  must  admit,  old  chap,"  he  murmured,  "that 
I  think  you're  inclined  to  be  hypercritical.  I'm 
fairly  well-read,  and  I  flatter  myself  I'm  not 
devoid  of  taste,  but  Reybaud's  plays  are  quite 
good  enough  for  me." 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  301 

Oliphant  drummed  his  fingers  restlessly  on  the 
cloth.  "Do  you  ask  as  much  from  the  theatre 
as  you  do  from  your  books?"  he  returned.  "Does 
Reybaud  satisfy  you  in  the  library?" 

"I've  never  read  him.  But  I've  seen  two  or 
three  of  his  pieces,  and,  I'm  bound  to  say,  en- 
joyed them." 

"And  anyhow,"  said  Blanche,  "it  isn't  a  ques- 
tion of  reading  in  the  library;  it  isn't  a  question 
whether  he's  good,  bad,  or  indifferent — the  ques- 
tion is  whether  he  succeeds." 

Otho  was  silent,  and  Oliphant  looked  at  him 
inquiringly. 

"Is  that  your  view  too?"  he  asked.  "It  wasn't 
the  view  you  held  when  we  took  the  theatre.  You 
knew  what  my  aim  was  from  the  beginning. 
Heaven  knows  you  can't  be  sorrier  than  I  am 
for  the  way  things  have  gone  so  far,  but  it  was 
never  understood  between  us  that  if  fine  work 
spelt  failure,  I  was  to  play  rubbish  to  retrieve  it. 
I  don't  want  a  theatre  to  play  rubbish;  I'd  rather 
have  none  than  be  in  management  to  give  the 
lie  to  intentions  I've  expressed  all  my  life." 
He  turned  to  Blanche.  "If  you  don't  care  for 
nine-tenths  of  Shakespeare,  surely  there's  one 
character  that  attracts  you?  Is  there  no  choice 
between  the  best  modern  work  and  Felix  Rey- 
baud?" 


302  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

Otho  replied  for  her,  with  affected  lightness. 

"Dear  old  man,"  he  said,  fidgeting  with  his 
coffee  spoon,  "aren't  you  taking  the  matter  too 
seriously?  If  we — er — if  we  made  a  mistake 
when  we  opened  the  house — and  I  suppose  we 
did  make  a  mistake — it  seems  to  me  that  we 
should  make  a  bigger  one  still  if  we  were  ashamed 
to  acknowledge  it.  When  all  is  said,  the  theatre 
is  the  theatre,  it's  a  place  of  entertainment ;  aren't 
you  rather  apt  to  forget  that?  What  is  it 
Austin  Dobson  says? — 

'Parnassus'  peaks  still  catch  the  sun; 

But  why,  O  lyric  brother ! 
Why  build  a  pulpit  on  the  one, 

A  platform  on  the  other?' 

I  think  it  applies,  Royce." 

Oliphant  had  turned  very  pale,  and  the  last 
vestige  of  hope  sank  from  his  heart.  He  nodded 
slowly. 

"Yes,"  he  said;  "perhaps  the  pulpit  is  too 
strong  in  me.  But  circumstances  are  stronger, 
aren't  they?  We  won't  argue  any  more;  we'll 
try  to  get  La  Curieuse." 

Now,  when  he  was  beaten,  he  longed  for 
Alma's  consolation,  even  while  he  winced  at  the 
thought  of  avowing  his  decision  to  her.  If  she 
knew  all,  she  would  be  compassionate;  but  he 
could  not  disclose  all,  and  he  trembled  lest  she 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  808 

should  find  the  obvious  insufficient  to  exonerate 
him.  She  had  once  told  him  that  he  was  weak — 
he  had  remembered  that  since;  perhaps  she  would 
view  him  only  as  a  renegade  clinging  to  power 
at  the  price  of  his  faith? 

But  her  gaze  was  clearer  than  he  guessed.  She 
saw  that  he  had  mated  his  antithesis;  and 
partially  she  understood.  Her  pity  for  him  had 
never  been  so  earnest,  nor  the  love  that  had 
been  born  in  her  so  deep.  Only  now  she  knew 
how  deep  it  was,  this  love  that  yearned  to  burst 
from  her  lips  and  eyes — knew  that  if  he  had 
come  to  her  ashamed,  a  coward  and  apostate 
self -condemned,  she  would  have  loved  him  still. 

And  Blanche  was  twice  triumphant:  for  per- 
sistent effort  obtained  the  English  rights  of  La 
Curieuse,  and  there  was  no  character  in  the  piece 
that  even  Oliphant  could  assert  would  suit  Miss 
King.  As  a  manageress  Blanche  was  annoyed 
at  this  period  only  by  her  father,  who  on  hearing 
that  the  policy  of  the  theatre  was  to  be  changed, 
had  developed  an  unexpected  tone,  and  finally 
appeared  to  have  on  hand  a  large  assortment  of 
rejected  manuscripts  ranging  from  melodrama 
to  musical  comedy.  She  did  not  read  them,  but 
he  wrote  urgent  letters  to  her  on  the  subject,  and 
importuned  her  in  her  drawing-room,  until  she 
was  so  angered  that  she  would  have  produced  in 


304  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

preference  the  weakest  of  the  plays  that  were 
submitted  to  the  theatre  daily  by  unknown  men. 

The  adaptation  of  Reybaud's  work  had  been 
entrusted  to  Campion,  with  the  assurance  that 
it  would  be  put  into  rehearsal  as  speedily  as  the 
parts  could  be  type- written.  Stimulated  by  such 
startling  propinquity  to  fees — he  was  still  await- 
ing the  production  of  a  comedy  that  had  been 
accepted  five  years  ago — he  completed  the  task 
in  ten  days,  and  the  run  of  The  Average  Man, 
which  was  entailing  a  loss  every  week,  drew  to  a 
conclusion. 

Alma  had  not  regretted  to  learn  that  her  en- 
gagement at  the  Mayfair  must  terminate.  In- 
deed, she  had  already  asked  herself  if  she  could 
remain  there  even  were  she  desired  to  do  so. 
Although  she  honoured  Royce  too  greatly  to 
think  he  would  confess  his  love,  honoured  her- 
self too  much  to  fear  she  would  betray  her  own, 
the  very  hopelessness  with  which  she  contem- 
plated meeting  him  no  more  showed  her  that  their 
meetings  should  cease.  After  she  left  his  theatre 
their  lines  would  he  apart;  she  might  remain  in 
London — that  was  to  be  expected  now — and  yet 
rarely  speak  to  him  again.  She  would  see  him 
from  the  stalls  sometimes,  and  read  his  notices, 
and  pray  for  his  suecess ;  but  it  was  very  seldom 
that  they  would  meet  each  other  in  the  streets. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  305 

Oliphant  realised  that  too.  He  felt  it  as  he 
talked  to  her  on  the  last  night,  hungering  to 
take  her  hand  before  the  moment  of  adieu. 
From  the  stage,  which  he  had  just  left,  the 
dialogue  of  the  fourth  act  reached  them,  and 
when  the  curtain  fell,  it  would  fall  upon  the  end 
of  more  than  the  piece.  To-night  he  still  was 
playing  literature,  and  stood  beside  the  woman 
he  loved — to-morrow  the  theatre  would  be  void 
of  both. 

"So  it  is  nearly  over,"  he  said.  "  'For  the 
play,  I  remember,  pleased  not  the  million;  'twas 
caviare  to  the  general.'  Are  you  going  to  wish 
me  'luck'  before  you  go?"  For  the  first  time 
he  made  no  effort  to  conceal  his  humiliation. 

"I  wish  it  now,"  she  answered  with  the  ghost 
of  a  smile.  "I  hope  The  Modern  Eve  will  draw 
all  London.  You  ought  to  feel  confident :  Cam- 
pion writes  very  smartly,  and  I  hear  that  Rey- 
baud  has  never  done  anything  more — more  strik- 
ing than  La  Curieuse" 

"Then  you  congratulate  me?  .  .  .  Hark! 
they're  a  good  audience  to-night,  aren't  they? 
It  has  never  gone  so  well." 

"It  has  always  gone  well — with  the  people 
who  came,"  she  murmured. 

"With  the  people  who  came,"  repeated  Oli- 
phant.   He  turned  to  her  passionately.    "Why," 


806  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

he  exclaimed,  "why  have  I  failed?  You  know 
I've  failed.  You  don't  say  so,  but  you  know  it, 
and  you  know  that  I  know  it.  Why?  It  wasn't 
to  play  La  Curieuse  that  I  dreamed  of  manage- 
ment; we  didn't  think  of  Reybaud  when  we 
talked  in  Brighton — and  outside  the  Museum 
that  day.  I  hate  this  theatre!  I've  lost  another 
man's  money,  and  my  own  hope.  My  God  I 
I'm  going  to  produce  the  worst  example  of 
the  worst  school,  and  I  haven't  the  right  to 
refuse!" 

"Look  forward!"  she  cried;  "don't  look  back! 
No,  you  have  not  failed.  Hark  again! — that  is 
applause  for  fine  work.  Re-read  the  criticisms! 
■ — there  is  a  Press  that  has  understood  and  sup- 
ported you  from  the  first.  Your  theatre  is  too 
big,  your  expenses  are  too  large;  here  you  must 
depend  upon  the  'million.'  One  day  you  will 
fight  for  your  belief  again;  and  with  a  smaller 
house  you'll  conquer  yet." 

He  looked  away  from  her,  with  haggard  eyes, 
at  the  unattainable.  Yes,  with  her  he  would 
have  conquered  yet;  but  the  future  that  he 
could  foresee  held  nothing.  With  her,  thought 
would  have  been  exalted,  and  purpose  fortified 
by  the  grandeur  of  her  own  soul.  He  knew  it, 
as — in  the  mightiness  of  his  longing  for  her — he 
knew  that  this  defeat  wringing  his  heart  to-night 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  307 

would  have  been  welcome  if  for  one  moment  it 
had  yielded  him  the  comfort  of  her  kiss. 

Now  from  the  stage  and  the  mouth  of  his  wife, 
came  the  cue  for  his  return  to  the  scene ;  and  when 
he  spoke  to  Alma  next,  the  last  night  had  ended, 
and  she  wore  her  coat  and  hat.  She  had  taken 
leave  of  Blanche  and  him  together  before  she 
went  to  her  dressing-room,  but  he  had  hastened 
from  his,  as  she  had  divined  he  would,  to  clasp 
her  hand  again.  It  was  the  single  weakness  of 
which  she  had  been  guilty  that  her  hand  was  bare. 

They  stood  for  a  minute  in  the  whitewashed 
passage,  face  to  face. 

"Are  you  wrapped  up  enough?  Won't  you 
be  cold?" 

"Oh,  this  stuff  is  very  thick,"  she  said,  "and 
it's  warmly  lined  besides." 

"You  ought  to  turn  up  the  collar,"  he  mur- 
mured; "you've  nothing  round  your  throat." 

"No,  I'm  quite  all  right;  really!" 

"You'll  have  a  cab?  It's  snowing  hard,  some- 
body said." 

"Yes,  I've  sent  for  one — I  expect  it's  here 
now." 

"Well,  I — I  wish  you  all  the  success  and  happi- 
ness you  can  ask  for  yourself.  But  you  know 
that,  don't  you?" 

"Yes,  I'm  sure  of  it.    And — you'll  never  say 


308  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

you've  lost  your  hope  any  more,  will  you?  Good- 
night." 

"Good-night,"  he  said.  ...  "I  wish  you'd 
turn  your  collar  up." 

"There!  Now  I'm  quite  safe,"  she  answered, 
smiling. 

And  in  this  fashion  the  man  and  woman  be- 
tween whom  not  a  word  of  love  had  yet  been 
spoken  said  good-bye. 


CHAPTER  XX 

"To  speak  in  more  favourable  terms  of  The 
Modern  Eve  would  be  practically  to  discredit  the 
enterprise  and  judgment  of  a  manager  who  had 
inspired  the  hope  that " 

Yes!  Oliphant  had  foreseen  that.  He  was 
reading  a  notice  cut  from  one  of  the  journals 
to  which  Alma  had  referred  when  she  said  there 
was  a  Press  that  had  supported  him.  He  picked 
up  another: 

"It  may  not  be  astonishing  that  The  Average 
Man  should  be  followed  by  The  Inquisitive 
Woman,  but  it  is  distressing.  In  Paris  I  was 
merely  bored  by  La  Curieuse,  but  at  the  Mayfair 
I  was  pained.  I  hasten  to  say  that  my  pain 
was  by  no  means  shared  by  the  audience,  who 
evidently  found  in  M.  Reybaud's  work,  judi- 
ciously watered  by  Mr.  Campion,  a  pabulum  to 
their  taste.    Nevertheless " 

There  was  a  third  slip  lying  beside  him — the 
tone  was  the  same,  a  tone  of  irony  and  regret. 
From  these  organs  he  had  derived  gleams  of 

309 


310  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

consolation  hitherto,  and  he  winced  this  morning 
as  if  three  friends  had  turned  their  faces  from 
him  in  the  street. 

But  the  piece  had  been  produced  a  week,  and 
was  playing  to  excellent  business.  The  booking 
was  increasing  daily,  and  there  was  every  promise 
that  a  great  financial  success  would  be  achieved. 
When  the  box-office  sheets  were  so  agreeable  to 
peruse,  he  would  be  held  unreasonable  to  be  de- 
pressed by  three  columns  of  type! 

In  a  month  from  the  date  of  the  production 
Blanche's  caprice  had  been  abundantly  justified. 
Boards  announcing  that  the  house  was  full  were 
displayed  outside  the  Mayf air  every  evening,  and 
in  the  presence  of  such  good  fortune  his  attitude 
exasperated  her.  That  he  should  comport  him- 
self as  if  they  had  had  another  failure,  when 
they  had  the  longest  advertisement  in  The  Daily 
Telegraph,  and  a  demand  for  boxes,  and  queues 
at  the  pit  and  gallery-doors  hours  before  they 
opened,  was  an  annoyance  which  not  even  the 
additional  frequency  of  her  entertainments  could 
assuage.  He  was  truly  an  impossible  person! 
She  felt  it  more  and  more.  An  ordinary  man 
would  have  owned  that  his  judgment  had  been 
at  fault,  and  thanked  her;  but  did  her  husband? 
So  far  from  acknowledging  his  error,  he  didn't 
seem  to  recognise  that  it  had  been  demonstrated. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  311 

If  it  had  not  been  for  Otho,  she  would  have  been 
miserable;  his  was  the  only  real  companionship 
that  she  had.  And  then  Royce  remonstrated, 
and  called  her  improvident  because  she  gave 
parties  1  In  truth — the  reflection  occurred  to 
her  one  afternoon  as  she  mused  by  the  fire — in 
truth  she  was  taking  a  very  noble  course  in  doing 
so;  it  was  not  every  woman  in  her  position  who 
would  have  striven  to  interest  herself  in  social 
gaieties  when  a  young  man  with  thousands  a  year 
was  dying  of  love  for  her ! 

Did  she  care  for  him  seriously?  She  pursed 
her  lips;  well,  not  as  she  had  cared  for  Royce 
once,  of  course — that  had  been  a  headstrong 
passion;  she  would  never  have  married  Otho 
Fairbairn  if  he  had  been  an  actor  in  his  third 
London  engagement.  Still  she  did  like  him. 
As  he  was,  she  would  marry  him  like  a  shot  if 
she  were  free.  Good  Lord,  how  happy  she'd  have 
been  with  him!  "Happy"?  What  a  word  for 
the  life  she  might  have  led!  The  jewellery  he 
would  have  bought  for  her;  and  the  horses  and 
carriages! — she'd  have  had  a  Russian  sable  rug 
in  the  victoria,  and — and  she  would  have  had  a 
theatre  too — he  would  have  let  her  do  anything 
she  pleased!  .  .  .  Her  foot  was  resting  on  the 
fender,  and  she  admired  it  pensively.  Royce 
wouldn't  despair;  but  that  would  be  the  end  of 


312  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

her  friendship  with  the  Flecks  and Oh  no, 

no,  she  was  a  virtuous  woman  I 

She  had  found  occasion  to  remind  herself  of 
it;  and,  though  she  did  not  realise  the  fact,  the 
thought  that  had  given  her  pause  was  that  if 
she  sinned  she  would  lose  Society. 

The  hundredth  night  of  The  Modern  Eve  was 
reached  without  any  diminution  of  the  receipts, 
and  Oliphant  rejoiced  like  a  prisoner  who  ap- 
proaches release.  Now  that  the  money  that  had 
been  lost  by  the  earlier  plays  would  be  recovered, 
he  would  be  free  to  tell  Fairbairn  that  he  wished 
to  withdraw  from  the  theatre.  Management  on 
the  lines  he  was  required  to  travel  henceforward 
was  a  prospect  before  which  he  quailed ;  and  since 
the  remainder  of  the  lease  could  be  transferred 
easily  enough,  there  would  be  no  cause  for  com- 
plaint on  either  side.  That  the  adaptation  would 
continue  to  attract  the  public  until  the  middle 
of  July — that  its  run  in  London  would  have 
made  the  Mayf  air  a  profitable  speculation — there 
could  be  no  doubt.  Therefore  he  would  not 
even  take  the  detested  piece  "out"  in  the  autumn! 
That  Otho  should  not  suffer  by  his  hatred  of  it, 
he  would  accept  the  best  of  the  numerous  offers 
for  the  provincial  rights. 

When  Blanche  inquired  whether  an  autumn 
tour  was  being  arranged,  he  told  her  "no." 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  313 

"Well,  isn't  it  time  we  got  some  dates?"  she 
asked.  "What  have  we  got  an  acting-manager 
for?  I  tell  you  that  man  is  no  use — he  looks  very 
nice,  but  that's  all  he  thinks  about !  I  hear,  when 
everybody  was  coming  out  the  other  evening,  he 
stood  at  the  top  of  the  stairs  saying  good-night 
to  three  girls  he'd  passed  in.  That  sort  of  thing 
lets  the  show  down,  you  know!  It's  very  bad — 
people  think  that  half  the  house  is  paper." 

Oliphant  hesitated  nervously.  "Look  here, 
Blanche,"  he  said,  "I  don't  want  to  go  out  with 
the  piece,  that's  why  nothing  is  being  done.  If 
Otho  gets  his  money  back,  I  want  to  drop  The 
Modern  Eve,  and  the  Mayfair  too.  Let  us  take 
engagements  again;  I  can't  go  on  this  way." 

"You  want  to  drop  the  Mayfair?"  she  stam- 
mered, paling.    "Do  you  mean  it?" 

"I  can't  go  onl"  he  repeated.  "Oh,  for 
Heaven's  sake  try  to  see  it  from  my  point  of 
view  for  once;  don't  let's  have  another  argument! 
I'm  ashamed — that's  the  word;  I  couldn't  resign 
myself  to  playing  this  sort  of  stuff;  I  couldn't!" 

She  looked  at  him  speechlessly,  her  blue  eyes 
ablaze  with  wrath. 

"I  think  you're  a  lunatic,"  she  said  hoarsely, 
at  last.  "My  God!  I  think  you're  a  lunatic; 
I  do,  on  my  soul!  You'd  like  to  ruin  yourself 
and  everybody  connected  with  you." 


314.  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"If  Otho  gets  his  money  back- 


'Oh,  don't  talk  to  me  about  getting  his  money 
back!"  she  exclaimed.  "Whom  has  he  got  to 
thank  for  it,  you  or  me?  Would  you  ever  have 
got  it  back  for  him?  Never  in  this  world !  And 
when  I  proposed  the  piece  which  by  your  own 
showing  has  rescued  you,  rescued  you  from  the 
overwhelming  burden  of  a  West  End  theatre, 
you  had  the  insolence  to  sneer  at  me  in  front  of 
him!" 

"I  'sneered'  at  you?    When?" 

"You  know  very  well  when!  When  we  were 
discussing  the  piece  at  lunch  that  day.  You 
know  you  did!  Your  whole  tone  was  an  insult 
— making  out  that  I  was  uneducated  and  had 
no  taste.  You  tried  to  make  me  look  as  small  as 
you  could.  But  he  didn't  think  any  more  of  you 
for  it,  I  could  see!" 

"What  you  say  is  absolutely  untrue.  That 
we  shall  never  feel  the  same  way  about  the  stage 
as  long  as  we  live  I'm  quite  sure,  but  it  can't  be 
necessary  to  quarrel  about  it.  As  to  Otho's  hav- 
ing to  thank  you  for  our  present  success,  that's 
a  fact  that  I've  admitted  often." 

"You  haven't!"  she  cried;  "and  you've  had 
cause  to  thank  me  a  damned  sight  more  than 
Otho,  if  you  knew  it!"  Her  rage  had  mastered 
her. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  315 

"I  don't  understand  you,"  said  Oliphant 
sternly;  "you  can  explain  yourself  when  you 
can  talk  like  a  lady." 

"I  don't  wish  to  talk  at  all!  .  .  .  If  you'd  like 
to  know  what  I  mean,  I  told  him  that  you  ought 
to  have  a  theatre — I  knew  you  never  would! 
And  he  quite  agreed  with  me;  that's  why  he 
made  you  the  offer." 

"I  see,"  said  Oliphant;  "that  was  it?  Yes, 
I  suppose  I  have  had  cause  to  thank  you.  I'd 
rather  you  hadn't  done  it,  though  it  may  sound 
ungrateful  to  say  so.  Well,  we  have  had  our 
theatre,  and  it  hasn't  fulfilled  my  hopes.  Can't 
we  recognise  the  fact  calmly?" 

"It  hasn't  fulfilled  your  hopes?  We  are  coin- 
ing money,  and  it  hasn't  fulfilled Oh!  oh 

no,  please  don't  say  any  more!"  She  clasped  her 
head.  "I  am  at  my  limit!  It's  quite  understood 
— you  are  going  to  give  it  up.    That's  enough!" 

She  did  not  speak  again  during  the  day,  and 
a  perfunctory  remark  that  he  offered  at  dinner 
fell  still-born.  At  seven  o'clock  they  drove  to 
the  Mayfair,  where  the  audience  heard  the  first 
words  that  she  had  addressed  to  him  for  nine 
hours.  Their  love-scenes,  however,  "went"  as 
well  as  usual,  and  when  he  led  her  before  the 
curtain,  and  she  smiled  to  his  bow,  the  suggestion 
of  connubial  felicity  was  beautiful  to  behold. 


316  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

But  though  she  was  resolved  not  to  reopen 
the  subject  until  the  time  came  when  it  could 
no  longer  be  ignored,  Blanche  could  dwell  on 
little  else.  When  Otho  presented  himself,  per- 
turbed, for  an  explanation,  she  again  rendered 
a  mental  tribute  to  his  sympathy.  Her  hope 
that  Oliphant  would  recant  was  of  the  slightest 
— his  second  thoughts  would  doubtless  be  as  be- 
sotted as  his  first!  Dismay  engulfed  her,  and 
the  ignominy  of  abdication  poisoned  her  very 
dreams. 

Her  reveries  were  now  more  frequent  than 
before.  The  silence  between  her  and  Oliphant 
had  been  broken,  but  her  grievance  was  manifest 
in  her  accents,  and  their  speech  was  very  con- 
strained. She  had  no  heart  to  visit,  and  he  lacked 
heart  to  sit  at  home  viewing  her  resentment. 
Hence  she  was  often  alone  in  the  Green  Street 
drawing-room,  and — as  the  reverberation  of  his 
announcement  subsided — to  enliven  her  solitude 
she  once  or  twice  returned  with  curious  eyes  to 
the  edge  of  the  abyss  from  which  two  months 
ago  she  had  started  back  afraid.  She  could  now 
look  down  without  turning  dizzy  quite  so  soon. 
She  repeated  that  there  would  be  no  more  cards 
like  these  lying  in  a  tray  on  her  table.  "Yes, 
she  would  be  making  a  great  sacrifice  for  him!" 
Of  course — just  for  pastime  imagining  that  she 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  317 

did  do  such  a  thing — after  the  divorce  he  would 
marry  her;  there  was  no  doubt  about  that. 
People  did  forget  in  time — especially  when  one 
was  an  actress.  And  really,  if  they  didn't  plenty 
of  women  would  regard  a  vast  fortune  as  ample 
compensation.  She  could  not  do  so  herself;  but 
plenty  of  women  would!  Plenty  of  women 
would  consider  that  they  were  quite  justified  in 
leaving  a  husband  like  Royce!  What  joy  had 
she  in  her  life?  If  her  dear  little  baby  had  been 
spared  to  her,  she  would  never  have  been 
tempted.  Ah,  her  sweet  little  baby,  how  devoted 
she  had  been  to  him !  When  a  man  was  indiffer- 
ent to  his  wife,  it  wasn't  astonishing  if  her  crav- 
ing for  affection  proved  too  great  for  her 
strength.  This  tenderness  that  had  been  awak- 
ened in  her  was  natural.  As  Royce  had  said 
when  he  proposed  to  her,  to  be  an  artist  a  woman 
must  love. 

Just  because  she  had  attempted  to  lull  despair 
for  five  minutes  by  the  writing  of  a  little  para- 
graph !  If  he  had  had  human  instincts,  he  would 
have  pitied  her  the  more  for  that  pathetic  effort. 
And  he  was  to  allow  himself  all  latitude,  while 
she  was  denied  consolation?  Plenty  of  women 
would  laugh  at  her  as  a  fool!  Of  course  he  was 
false  to  her — how  could  she  question  it  even  for 


818  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

an  instant?  He  was  false  to  her  with — with 
Alma  King! 

This  new  idea  offered  her  comfort.  In  the 
days  that  followed  she  strove  to  believe  it.  Alma 
was  now  playing  at  the  Pall  Mall,  and  Oliphant 
had  not  seen  her  since  she  left  their  company, 
but  Blanche  wished  to  persuade  herself  that  they 
were  guilty.  Vague  accusations  of  infidelity  no 
longer  satisfied  her,  and  to  excuse  her  own  in- 
creased temptation,  she  sought  to  point  definitely 
to  the  woman. 

The  Modern  Eve  achieved  its  destiny,  and  as 
the  business  dropped  and  the  general  exodus 
from  town  commenced,  it  was  decided  that  in 
another  fortnight  Oliphant's  reign  at  the  May- 
fair  should  cease. 

Blanche  accepted  his  intimation  of  the  fact 
with  the  fewest  words  possible,  and  rewarded 
herself  for  their  sparsity  by  many  comments  to 
Otho.  Passionately  as  she  had  exulted  in  the 
possession  of  a  theatre,  it  seemed  to  her  in  this 
final  fortnight  that  she  had  never  appreciated  it 
enough.  Each  time  the  door-keeper  touched  his 
cap  to  her  as  she  entered,  she  suffered  a  pang, 
in  picturing  him  saluting  another  manageress 
soon.  The  star-room  where  she  dressed  stung 
her  with  the  reminder  that  where  she  played  her 
next  part  the  star-room  would  be  another's.    The 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  319 

respect  of  the  vilified  acting-manager  with  the 
returns  was  a  sword-thrust,  as  she  realised  how 
speedily  she  would  have  declined  to  the  insignifi- 
cance of  a  salary. 

And  as  the  days  slipped  past,  Otho  Fairbairn 
suffered  no  less  acutely.  She  would  lose  power, 
and  he  would  lose  pretext.  With  the  closure  of 
the  Mayfair,  the  ostensible  motive  for  his  dalli- 
ance in  London  would  be  removed ;  and  he  stood 
face  to  face  with  the  truth.  Now  he  must  either 
go  away  and  resign  himself  to  misery,  or  realise 
that  he  was  too  violently  in  love  with  his  friend's 
wife  to  leave  her.    He  decided  to  go  away. 

He  determined  the  matter  in  the  small  hours 
while  he  lay  praying  for  sleep,  or  his  shaving- 
water  ;  and  in  the  afternoon  when  the  sun  shone, 
and  he  drifted  to  Green  Street,  he  felt  ennobled 
by  his  resolution. 

Blanche,  as  was  so  often  the  case  latterly,  was 
sipping  tea  by  herself.  It  was  the  half -hour  he 
always  found  most  charming.  The  shaded  room 
was  restful  after  the  glare  of  the  Park,  and  the 
flowers  looked  cooler  within  doors,  and  sweeter. 
Their  fragrance  too  could  be  detected  here;  as 
he  greeted  her  he  felt  the  perfume  of  the  roses 
she  was  wearing,  roses  that  he  saw  had  been 
chosen  from  the  basket  that  he  had  sent. 

"I  wondered  if  you  would  come  round,"  she 


320  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

said.  "Thanks  ever  so  much  for  those — they're 
simply  exquisite." 

"Have  you  been  out?"  he  asked,  dropping  into 
an  arm-chair. 

"No;  it's  too  hot.    Well?    Tea?" 

"Thanks.  Well!  'Our  story  approaches  the 
end'?  It's  extraordinary  the  hold  a  theatre  takes 
on  one;  I  begin  to  feel  as  if  I'd  been  interested 
in  the  Mayfair  all  my  life.  I  shall  be  lost  when 
we  close." 

She  sighed.    "And  I/" 

"Well,  you'll  be  on  the  stage — it  won't  be 
quite  the  same  thing;  I  shall  only  be  able  to  sit 
in  the  stalls.  You  can't  imagine  how  I  shall  miss 
the  pass-door  and  the  wings.  At  least,  you  can, 
because  you're  an  actress,  but  a  good  many 
people  would  think  it  affectation." 

"I  suppose  the  wings  somewhere  might  still  be 
possible?"  she  said.  "But  I  understand  what 
you  mean,  of  course.  You  don't  really  think  it 
will  be  a  greater  change  for  you  than  me,  though  ? 
You  can  always  run  a  theatre  if  you  want  to — 
that  isn't  difficult.  To  me — oh,  my  dear  boy,  the 
change  will  be  frightful !  Now  that  you've  given 
me"  a  taste  for  management  I  shall  simply  hate 
an  engagement;  I  shall  loathe  it!" 

He  looked  his  commiseration,  and  she  nodded 
repeatedly. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  321 

"It  will  be  hideous.  To  have  to  go  to  rehearsal 
whether  I'm  in  the  humour  or  not,  and  be  dictated 
to  by  the  stage-manager,  and  have  my  pet  busi- 
ness altered  to  improve  somebody  else's  part, 

and Oh,  you  haven't  an  idea!     When  a 

woman  who  has  once  been  her  own  manageress 
takes  an  engagement  again,  I  can  tell  you  she 
feels  the  difference  here."  She  put  her  hand  to 
her  heart. 

"Even  now,  you  know,"  said  Otho  after  a 
slight  pause,  "it  isn't  too  late,  if  Royce  is  willing 
to  go  on.    Nothing  is  settled." 

"He  won't;  don't  entertain  such  an  idea  for 
a  moment — he  won't!  No,  Royce  is  relieved — 
I  can  assure  you  he  is  relieved — to  think  that 
there  are  only  four  more  nights  before  we  finish." 

"It's  a  thousand  pities,"  he  murmured;  "I'm 
sorrier  than  I  can  say.    He's  been  consistent,  of 

course;  one  can't  deny  that,  but Well,  I'm 

bound  to  admit  he  seems  to  me  to  be  playing 
the  fool." 

"  'Consistent' !  Oh,  let's  talk  about  some- 
thing else !" 

"He  explained  from  the  beginning  the  course 
he  meant  to  pursue.  Don't  fancy  I'm  making 
excuses  for  him,  but  it  was  understood  that  he'd 
only  conduct  a  theatre  on  certain  lines." 

Blanche  smiled. 


322  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

"But  it  was,  Mrs.  Royce!" 

"Oh,  I  know  all  that!"  she  said,  "but  do  you 
suppose  if "    She  rose  impatiently. 

"Do  I  suppose  if — what?" 

"Never  mind;  it  doesn't  matter!" 

"Tell  me.    What  were  you  going  to  say?" 

"I  was  going  to  say  'do  you  suppose  we  should 
be  leaving  the  theatre  if  Miss  King  had  remained 
in  it?' '  She  looked  round  into  his  startled  face. 
"That's  all!" 

"Miss  King?"    He  stared  up  at  her. 

"Are  you  going  to  pretend  you  didn't  know? 
You  needn't  be  considerate — my  eyes  have  been 
open  a  long  while.  As  soon  as  he  got  a  theatre, 
he  brought  her  into  it.  And  when  a  piece  that 
meant  a  fortune  was  to  be  had,  he  opposed  it 
because  there  was  no  part  in  it  for  her;  and  be- 
cause he  was  furious  when  you  took  my  side  and 
he  was  obliged  to  let  her  go,  he  revenged  himself 
on  me  by  giving  the  theatre  up." 

"Good  God!  .  .  .  Oh  no?" 

"I  don't  say  that  the  theatre  managed  in  an 
ordinary  way  would  ever  have  made  him  happy 
— I  know  it  wouldn't ;  but  he'd  never  have  gone 
to  such  a  length  as  this  if  he  thought  I  was  blind 
enough  to  have  that  woman  back  in  it.  So  mad 
as  that  he's  not!  It  was  plain  enough  surely? 
Everybody  in  the  company  must  have  talked. 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  323 

In  two  months'  time  you'll  see  them  both  playing 
at  the  same  house."  Her  arms  fell  impotently. 
"And  so  shall  //" 

Unconsciously  she  had  taken  the  pose  that 
she  had  adopted  in  Oliphant's  play,  when  as 
"Maud"  she  imagined  that  "Mrs.  Vaughan" 
was  "Clement's"  mistress.  Her  expression  was 
the  same.  Now,  as  then,  her  sensibilities  were 
profoundly  stirred  by  a  situation  which  her 
judgment  knew  to  be  fictitious.  She  believed 
this  thing  only  while  she  wished  to  believe  it, 
and  hitherto  the  belief  had  been  assuasive.  But 
impulse  had  carried  her  before  an  "audience" — 
and  now  she  sounded  the  depths ;  the  humiliation 
was  revealed,  and  her  voice  broke. 

"I  can't  believe  it,"  he  said  huskily;  "I'll  swear 
I've  never  had  a  suspicion!  You  must  be 
wrong." 

"Heavens!  Do  you  think  I  look  for  these 
things — that  I'm  jealous?"  Her  laugh  was 
bitter.  "I  only  care  because  I'm  a  woman  and 
I've  pride  to  be  hurt;  for  Royce  I  care  no  more 
than  I  do  for  that  chair.  If  I  weren't  a  fool,  I 
suppose  I  shouldn't  care  at  all,  but  .  .  .  Ah, 
don't  worry  about  me — I'm  used  to  it  by 
now!" 

She  turned  aside,  and  leant  her  elbows  on  the 
mantelpiece,  her  head  between  her  closed  hands. 


8S4  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

There  was  a  long  silence,  while  he  struggled  to 
remain  in  his  seat. 

"I'm  frightfully  sorry  for  you,"  he  stammered, 
rising. 

Her  face  was  hidden  from  him,  but  her  little 
nods  were  grateful,  and  pathetic.  He  stood 
combating  the  temptation  to  touch  her — his 
sympathy  yearned  to  touch  her,  while  his  pru- 
dence warned  him  to  resist.  His  hand  moved 
towards  her  twice,  and  was  twice  caught  back. 
Then  he  drew  hers  down. 

"Don't — I  can't  bear  to  see  you  miserable," 
he  said. 

Her  fingers  thanked  him,  and  now  he  perceived 
that  she  was  crying. 

"If  you  knew  how  hard  my  life  is!"  she  fal- 
tered. 

She  raised  her  eyes  to  him;  and  the  next  mo- 
ment he  had  kissed  her. 

But  the  words  that  poured  from  him  were  not 
the  words  demanded  by  her  mood.  He  up- 
braided himself,  and  vowed  that  he  would  never 
see  her  again.  She  did  not  want  to  pity  his 
self-reproaches — she  wanted  him  to  silence  hers. 
He  was  her  penitent,  and  she  would  have  had 
him  her  master.  She  was  begged  to  understand 
his  remorse,  and  she  wanted  to  be  swept  from 
hesitation  by  his  love.    As  she  listened,  the  out- 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  325 

look  grew  strangely  dark,  the  gloom  of  it  chilled 
her,  and  she  felt  forlorn.  A  sense  of  hopelessness 
overwhelmed  her — and  she  realised  that  she  had 
hoped. 

He  went  from  her  abased.  The  kiss  and  his 
avowal  had  rendered  him  contemptible ;  and  that 
she  had  told  him  she  was  fond  of  him  seemed  to 
increase  his  enormity.  He  wished  she  had  not 
told  him  she  was  fond  of  him — the  impression 
left  by  the  afternoon  was  graver  because  she  had 
said  that.  But  if  she  had  been  anybody's  wife 
but  Oliphant's!  Terrible  that  a  woman's  per- 
fection could  be  patent  to  all  the  world  except 
her  husband!  Her  view  of  the  retirement  from 
the  Mayfair  as  an  act  of  retaliation  was  far- 
fetched, preposterous,  but  though  she  was  mis- 
taken there,  the  main  charge  might  be  true. 
What  wonder  that  she  was  unhappy,  poor  girl? 
He  regretted  the  visit  passionately;  he  had  de- 
termined to  avoid  her,  and  he  was  given  cause 
to  feel  ashamed  after  all.  That  was  cruel !  And 
now,  too,  he  would  be  ten  times  more  wretched 
apart  from  her.  It  would  even  be  wrong  to  take 
leave  of  her — or  for  them  to  meet  in  a  year's  time 
— knowing  what  they  knew.  And  Oliphantl 
how  distressing  to  have  to  meet  Oliphant  again ! 

He  went  from  her  abased,  and  Blanche  sat 
motionless,  with  wide  eyes.    Never  had  she  per- 


326  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

mitted  herself  to  recognise  her  fancies  as  expec- 
tation, but  they  were  buried  in  their  real  name. 
How  their  companionship  had  sustained  her  their 
death  displayed.  She  knew  now  that  she  had 
desired  to  gain  the  existence  to  which  Otho  Fair- 
bairn  was  the  key ;  knew  that,  though  this  sudden 
sensation  of  blankness  would  not  last,  she  would 
remember  and  repine  as  long  as  she  lived — would 
think  of  the  might-have-been  when  she  had  lost 
her  prettiness  and  her  figure,  and  the  Lady 
Flecks  of  the  period  were  oblivious  of  an  elderly 
actress  whose  only  recommendation  was  her 
virtue.  Then  to  her  despondence  arose  the  ghost 
of  her  hope;  and  in  sight  of  it  she  demanded 
why  the  ambition  of  a  woman  like  herself  should 
be  frustrated  by  so  weak  a  man.  Man?  He  was 
a  boy  in  everything  but  his  age!  Should  she 
resign  herself  to  being  balked  by  his  scruples? 

She  went  to  the  Mayfair  that  evening  wonder- 
ing if  she  would  see  him ;  but  Otho  was  not  there. 
Nor  did  he  appear  on  the  next,  though  he  had 
been  compelled  to  accept  a  dinner  invitation  to 
support  his  oath.  On  the  penultimate  night  he 
failed;  but  he  compromised  with  resolution  by 
entering  the  theatre  only  for  a  few  minutes  to 
mention  that  he  was  going  to  Trouville. 

"You'll  come  to  Green  Street  first?"  she  asked. 

He  had  intended  to  make  his  adieux  to  her  and 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  327 

Oliphant  in  the  office  on  the  morrow,  but  now 
he  hesitated. 

"Do  you  think  I  had  better  go  to  the  house?" 
he  said. 

Her  face  hardened,  and  she  made  no  reply 
for  a  moment. 

"No!"  she  said  coldly.  "Good-bye.  I  hope 
it  will  be  a  pleasant  change,  Mr.  Fairbairn." 

"For  God's  sake  don't  be  cruel,"  he  muttered. 
"I'm  suffering  enough !" 

She  had  moved  apart  from  him,  and  he  fol- 
lowed her  humbly. 

"Blanche!    Are  you  angry  with  me?" 

"  'Angry'  ?"  she  echoed,  pausing.  "What  right 
have  I  to  be  'angry'  with  you?  You'll  do  as  you 
please,  of  course." 

"May  I  come  Sunday  for  half  an  hour?" 

"Sunday  I  shall  be  out,"  she  said.  .  .  .  "If 
you  wish  to,  come  to-morrow  afternoon." 

She  returned  to  the  dressing-room,  her  pulses 
quickened  by  suspense.  To-morrow  he  would 
again  tell  her  how  miserable  he  was;  but  would 
he  implore  her  to  make  him  happy?  It  would 
be  then  or  never!  If  he  would  but  beg  her  to 
leave  London  with  him — if  he  would  only  say 
the  words !  She  would  become  his  wife,  and  their 
elopement  would  be  forgotten.     The  prospect 


328  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

dizzied  her  and  swam  before  her  gaze;  she  quiv- 
ered in  contemplating  the  position. 

There  was  no  sign  of  agitation,  however,  in 
the  greeting  that  he  was  accorded ;  its  tranquillity 
relieved  him.  Her  manner  had  neither  the 
resentment  that  he  had  winced  at  on  the  pre- 
vious evening,  nor  the  implication  that  he  had 
vaguely  dreaded.  She  spoke  of  Trouville,  and 
asked  him  if  it  was  "nice."  There  was  a  casino, 
she  supposed?  Every  French  watering-place 
had  a  casino,  hadn't  it?  And  one  played  a  game 
called  "Little  Horses,"  which  was  the  Monte 
Carlo  gamble  adapted  for  the  nursery,  and  had 
ices  and  flirtations  on  a  terrace  overlooking  the 
sea?  How  he  would  enjoy  himself!  It  must  be 
delicious,  especially  after  dinner  in  the  moon- 
light. 

He  felt  that  it  would  indeed  be  delicious  were 
she  beside  him  there,  but  merely  answered  that 
it  would  bore  him  to  death.  Her  small  talk 
hurt  him  as  speedily  as  it  was  meant  to  do, 
although  before  he  came  he  had  perceived  in 
the  subject  of  Trouville  some  promise  of  safety. 
She  was  paler  than  usual,  he  noted;  there  were 
shadows  beneath  her  eyes,  and  in  spite  of  her 
attempt  at  animation,  her  tone,  her  pose  itself, 
had  a  certain  lassitude. 

It  was  now  for  him  to  sustain  her  courageous 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  329 

effort,  for  she  was  silent.  In  the  silence  her  face 
looked  wearier  still. 

"Where — which  theatre  do  you  think  you  will 
go  to  next?"  he  said,  when  the  pause  had  grown 
too  long. 

"How  can  I  tell?"  she  murmured.    "Why?" 

"I  should  have  liked  to  know  what  you  were 
going  to  do — I  shan't  be  in  London  for  a  long 
while;  I  don't  expect  I  shall  remain  in  Europe." 

"You  are  going  to  travel?  Where — in  im- 
possible places?    Have  you  made  your  plans?" 

He  shook  his  head. 

"You  mean  to  go  just  where  impulse  takes 
you?  How  lovely!  It  must  be  simply  perfect 
to  wander  about  the  world  like  that." 

" 'Perfect' ?"  said  he.  "You  know  that  I'm 
going  because  I  must!  You  know  very  well  I 
shall  be  wretched!" 

She  did  not  answer,  but  her  lips  trembled. 
When  they  had  trembled,  she  averted  her  face. 

"Don't  you  know  it?" 

"Perhaps  you  think  you  will.  You'll  soon 
forget  me.    A  man  can  forget  so  easily." 

Then  the  scene  of  which  she  had  been  confi- 
dent was  enacted.  He  told  her  all  that  she  had 
known  he  was  going  to  tell  her,  omitting  only 
the  petition  that  she  was  eager  to  hear.  Though 
his  devotion  dishonoured  him,  though  his  goddess 


830  THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 

was  clay,  this  ordeal  was  the  severest  that  he 
had  been  called  upon  to  bear;  to  part  from  her 
tortured  him ;  and  when  he  cried  that  he  "adored" 
her,  the  word  was  no  more  than  the  literal  ex- 
pression of  a  fact.  Her  suspense  began  to  be 
tinged  by  impatience,  even  by  misgiving. 

She  tore  her  hands  from  him,  and  sprang  to 
her  feet. 

"Why  did  you  come  into  my  life?"  she  ex- 
claimed; "I  could  have  borne  the  rest!" 

As  she  was  clasped,  she  was  momentarily  san- 
guine; but  expectation  faded,  and  the  coldness 
of  dismay  sank  through  her  limbs  again. 

"Say  good-bye  to  me!"  he  urged;  "for  God's 
sake,  let  me  say  it  while  I  can!" 

Her  eyes  fastened  on  him,  but  he  released  her, 
and  was  going.  She  watched  him  cross  the  room. 
All  that  she  thirsted  for  was  receding — affluence, 
splendour,  everything  that  could  make  life  worth 
living  was  in  this  man's  hold !  In  another  second 
the  darkness  would  have  fallen,  and  would  lift 
no  more.  She  would  not,  she  could  not,  let  him 
go!  She  uttered  a  great  cry,  and  threw  herself 
sobbing  on  the  couch. 

"I've  only  you  in  the  world !"  she  gasped,  cling- 
ing to  him. 

Then  suddenly — as  she  looked  up  into  his  white 
face — she  faltered.     Morality,  convention,  the 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER  331 

restraining  instinct,  awoke  and  terrified  her  in 
spite  of  herself.  She  strove  to  stifle  it,  to  harden 
herself  against  it,  she  battled  with  it  as  a  woman 
may  battle  with  a  physical  weakness.  Her  mind 
whirled.  Why  did  he  give  her  time  to  reflect? 
A  moment  more,  and  horror  would  have  con- 
quered her!    Why  didn't  he  succumb?  .  .  . 

Fairbairn  moved  towards  the  window,  and  the 
clock  ticked  away  a  minute  while  he  gazed  fixedly 
at  the  street.  A  hansom  was  crawling  along  the 
hot  road,  and  he  observed  the  minutiae  of  a  han- 
som for  the  first  time.  When  the  hansom  was 
out  of  sight  he  gradually  became  aware  that  he 
was  thinking.  He  was  conscious  of  a  dull  wonder 
at  his  own  apathy.  His  most  distinguishable 
feeling  was  regret,  but  neither  remorse  nor  pas- 
sion was  acute;  he  felt  dreary  and  sad.  The 
clock  ticked;  and  he  stood  realising  the  position. 
Well,  he  would  make  her  his  wife  as  soon  as 
possible.  .  .  .  Oliphant  would  despise  him — not 
more  than  he  deserved.  Perhaps  Oliphant  would 
marry  Miss  King  after  the  divorce?  If  they 
cared  for  each  other  much,  one  might  be  sure  he 
would — and  they'd  be  happy.  None  the  less, 
they  would  always  condemn  him,  Otho  Fairbairn, 
as  a  scoundrel.  .  .  .  But  his  worst  sin  was 
towards  the  angel  who  had  sacrificed  her  reputa- 


332 


THE  ACTOR-MANAGER 


tion  for  love  of  him!    At  this  point  he  looked 
round  at  her,  furtively,  ashamed. 

The  woman  whom  he  had  yet  to  understand 
lay  back  upon  the  sofa  with  her  eyes  closed — 
thinking  too. 


tf 


<or 


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